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THE 



RELIGION OF MANHOOD; 



OR, 



THE AGE OF THOUGHT. 



\U> 



IT / 

DR. J. H. ItOBINSON. 



No Atonement without Repentance, — no Repentance without 
Reform, — noJUsgrm. without Works. 



BOSTON 

BELA MARSH, 25 CORNHILL. 

1854. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by . 
BE LA MARSH, 
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts 



STEREOTYPED BY 

nOBART & BOBBINS, 

NEW ENGLAND TYPE AND STEREOTYPE FOUNDER?, 
BOSTON. 



CONTENTS. 



Page 
INTRODUCTION, BY THE AUTHOR, v 

INTRODUCTION, BY A. E. NEWTON, xv 

INVOCATION, 13 

THE PAST AND THE PRESENT, 17 

THE TRANSFORMATIONS, 27 

GOD IS NO RESPECTER OF PERSONS, . . 35 

OUR FATHER, 42 

FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE, 50 

THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT, 66 

EXPIATORY OFFERINGS, 85 

THE BIBLE, . . . 103 

REGENERATION, 116 

ANGELIC MINISTRY, \ . 126 

A VISION, .137 

THE MANHOOD OF JESUS, 151 

LABOR, . .156 



IV CONTENTS. 

Page 
THE RELIGION OF MANHOOD, 160 

THE ANGEL OF HOPE, . . 163 

PRACTICAL RELIGION, 168 

THE DESTINY OF MATTER, 173 

AN ANCIENT RACE, 184 

SECTARIANISM, 190 

LETTER TO A CLERGYMAN, 203 

HEALTH, 210 

GREAT MEN AND HEROES, .221 

THE CONFLICT OF AGES, 228 

APPENDIX, *. . • . 235 



INTRODUCTION. 



To avow one's sentiments, at proper times, and under certain 
circumstances, I believe is both, manly and right. When our views 
flow onward with the popular current it requires no moral courage to 
express and defend them ; but when we have arrived at conclusions 
entirely opposed to prevailing dogmas, not a little firmness and self- 
reliance is necessary to enable us to unfurl the independent flag, and 
drop into the ranks of the minority. It will be acknowledged, I pre- 
sume, that every person must believe something. Each individual 
must have certain notions of a creative Deity, and some kind of a 
theory of divine government. In this country, it is generally con- 
ceded that every man has a perfect right to believe just what he can, 
rationally. If he is disposed to take the Alcoran of Mahomet for his 
moral guide, I suppose the government of this republic will not inter- 
fere in the premises, so long as he leads a sober and orderly life. 
Those who embrace the Jewish and Christian testaments, as authority 
iu all matters pertaining to religion, have, also, the privilege of doing 
so. But one thing is obvious, and completely apparent to every oandid 
mind, — any person who really believes a given proposition, must do 
so from evidence. Belief and unbelief are things of necessity, although 
one may profess to receive as- true a proposition of which he knows 
literally nothing ; yet the difference between profession and reality is 
just the difference between truth and falsehood. The flower grows 
because conditions favor its development ; it has a fertile soil, gentle 
dews, genial rains, pure air, and bright sunshine. So a man believes, 
because conditions compel him to believe. This I conceive to be a 
sound and incontrovertible position, but one that is not understood by 
prevailing organizations. 

A* 



VI INTRODUCTION. 

It is my firm conviction that the God of Nature never intended, 
and does not require, that a single human existence should be gov- 
erned by a blind, unenlightened faith. It does not appear, to my 
comprehension, that the sublime God expects us to accept as true any 
proposition which we cannot, in some manner, comprehend, I believe 
in the immortality of the soul. But why, do I thus believe ? Simply, 
because conditions have been favorable to such a belief. Not because 
the doctrine of immortality is proved beyond cavil in the Jewish or 
Christian Scriptures ; not because this or that reverend clergyman 
has asserted it to be so ; not because our worthy minister, a few Sab- 
baths since, gave an accurate description of heaven, not forgetting its 
pearly gates, costly pavement, golden harps, white thrones, four and 
twenty beasts, &c, &c. ; but because reason and inspiration have 
brought it home to my own soul. A reverend doctor may assure me 
a thousand times that I have an immortal spirit ; but, providing I 
could see no reason for having an immortal spirit, it would, doubtless, 
be a long time before I became a full convert to his doctrine. I ask 
him, "How do you know that I have an immortal spirit? Did 
you ever see or hear, or have any tangible communication with a spir- 
itual existence, after it had thrown off its mortal organism ? " The 
learned doctor answers me in the negative. I remark, in return, 
" Perhaps you are acquainted with some fortunate individual, of high 
moral integrity, in whom you place implicit confidence, who has had 
tangible and indubitable evidence of the soul's immortality." Again 
I receive a cold negative, and am informed that " In other ages of 
the world, God spake to humanity by holy prophets, — inspired men, — 
who acted as they were acted upon by the Supreme Intelligence. " 

My answer to this is : — " If Deity has spoken to the world once, 
he will speak again. So far as I am able to gather any knowledge of 
his character, by beholding his operations in the illimitable fields of 
nature, I discover that he is impartial in his dispensations. He sends 
his rain on the just and on the unjust. If he is your God, he is mine ; 
if he is your father, he is mine ; if he spake to a prophet, he will 
speak to you, and to me, and to all his children, when conditions are 
the same. If men's minds were once open to revelation and inspira- 
tion, I see nothing to hinder the recurrence of the same phenomena 
at the present day. If spirits and angels, out of the body, mani- 
fested themselves tangibly to humanity in any age, it is very good evi- 
dence that they can and will do so again ; for what has occurred once 



INTRODUCTION. VII 

may again transpire, because God and Nature will never change. My 
friend and neighbor has as much right to believe that you and I have 
seen and conversed with an angel, as he has to believe the same thing 
in regard to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Daniel, Peter, and a host of 
others. They were men, so are we." 

Inspiration, then, must be a fixed fact, to exist as long as the race 
of mankind, and to be more or less evident as conditions are favorable 
or unfavorable. He who admits the Bible to be a book prepared at 
different times by spiritual assistance, does certainly concede the point, 
it appears to me, that the same manifestations may occur again. I 
believe that the human mind (the body also) may be powerfully acted 
upon by an independent, invisible intelligence ; because I have the 
best of reasons for supposing that my own organism has been the sub- 
ject of such influence. I need no man with a heavy salary to teach 
me, saying, " Know the truth of immortality ;" because the benevolent 
Father has placed it within my power, and in the power of every 
human existence, to become conscious of the cheering fact. Being 
myself a spirit, as to all that constitutes my self-consciousness and 
manhood, it appears to me quite natural that other spirits, existing 
in forms less gross than mine, should be attracted to establish some 
intelligible mode of communication with me ; and it is my fixed con- 
viction that such a relation has existed ; and, if this is true concerning 
myself, it must be true for others ; because God never steps out of the 
order of his government, and Nature never transcends her own laws, 
to gratify human curiosity or desires. 

We must learn to know that all things' move onward in obedience to 
inexorable law, and that conditions do, and must ever govern all 
development. There is nothing unnatural ; on the contrary, all 
things are completely and entirely natural. The sublimest manifesta- 
tions of Deity are found in Nature. There are no miracles, in the 
common acceptation of the word. There are phenomena not common ; 
they may be called wonderful, but not miraculous, strictly speaking. 
A miracle is usually understood as a phenomenon occurring in defi- 
ance of, and in open antagonism to, the established laws of. the uni- 
verse ; but it should be remembered that there are many laws with 
which we are not acquainted ; and an unfolded spiritual mind, living 
in the very region of law and causes, may be able to grasp those laws, 
and act surely and scientifically on the external and internal organ- 
isms of men. 



VIII INTRODUCTION. 

If a man is reasonable, philosophical, and benevolent in this world, 
why should he not be so in the next ? If he understands causes here, 
will he not have a deeper knowledge of causes there ? If dying makes 
one less wise, then we should try to discover the elixir vitce, and live 
forever. No person wishes to become an idiot in the next world who 
has a fair share of wisdom in this. If a mind out of the body desires to 
operate intelligibly upon a mind in the body, he will do so philosophi- 
cally, with a strict regard to the immutable law of cause and effect. 
The human intelligence, being benevolent while inhabiting a mortal 
body, and having labored arduously for the advancement of the race, 
will also be benevolent after being enfranchised from said body, and 
still delight to work for the good of mankind. 

We conclude, then, that if men truly exist after the change of death, 
they do not exist as fools, drivellers and idiots ; but are capable of 
thinking rationally, acting reasonably, studying cause and effect defi- 
nitely and philosophically. If an invisible intelligence operates upon 
my internal or external organism, I know that he does so by means 
of some beautiful law, with which I am, perchance, unacquainted, but 
may, possibly, at some future time, comprehend. Are my hands 
moved, — the movement is accomplished by some scientific process. Am 
I inspired to speak, and utter lofty strains of eloquence, — it is done by 
means just as natural and rational as the falling of the dew, or the 
descent of the rain. Am I impressed to dictate a communication upon 
some abstruse subject, — the same state of things exists, and calls forth 
my admiration. 

In my philosophy I find nothing supernatural ; all things become 
completely natural, and wholly within the plan of divine order. The 
rational and the natural flow each into the other ; while God, a divine 
principle, an infinite unity, permeates infinitude, presides benevolently 
over transformations of matter, forms and organisms. 

The following pages are not intended to be authoritative to any one. 
Authority infallible I have not yet found, nor do I expect to make 
such a discovery. I know of nothing external to myself on which to 
rely, with full assurance that I have no farther use for my perceptive 
and reasoning faculties. I perceive nothing before the human mind 
but action, — the true element of moral and physical salvation. 
Books may awaken thought, and in doing so accomplish their whole 
mission ; but they never can furnish to any person all the mental ali- 
ment which he needs as an intellectual being. For this work I set 



INTRODUCTION. IX 

up no pretensions. Let it be judged as every true man judges all 
things, — by their intrinsic merit. What appears just and reasonable 
receive, the remainder reject ; I ask nothing more. 

The matter of this work was dictated, at various times, to an 
amanuensis, and many articles went to press without revision, — with 
the sins of their first crudeness upon them. Several of my literary 
friends, having examined the manuscript, expressed an earnest desire 
for its publication, and, with some reluctance, I finally consented. If 
any portions of the work appear dogmatical to the reader, I beg to 
state that such is not the feeling of the mind through whose instru- 
mentality it originated. Having discovered no infallible standard of 
truth, I am not so unreasonable as to suppose that either my writings, 
or the doctrines they inculcate, will assume that relation to any one. 
Truth itself is progressive, and each individuality must keep pace with 
it, if he can. 

I would advise every person to maintain and respect his own indi- 
vidual sovereignty, — see with "his own mental eyes, hear with his 
own mental ears, walk upon his own intellectual feet, be self-reliant 
without egotism, and humble without degradation. A great field of 
discovery is open to all ; every mind may go forth, like Noah's dove, 
and return with some peaceful and ennobling thought. 

My belief in the possibility of communicating with spirits out of the 
body, is founded not so much upon the testimony of others as upon 
my own personal experience. That which comes directly home to my 
own consciousness, is fairly brought within the reach of my reasoning 
and determining faculties. I sustain a relation to, and have an ability 
to weigh it, which no person can possibly have who has not had the 
same experience. There are some things which bring with them their 
own evidence, and need no labored argumentation to make them 
appear realities ; their peculiar characteristics determine what they 
are. I cannot well dispute the genuineness of a power that has the cog- 
nizance of my best perceptions ; otherwise, I may seriously doubt the 
reality of my own existence. When the world reaches that state 
where the cognizing faculties that the God of Nature has given for the 
distinguishing features of manhood, are no longer considered safe 
guides, then will ensue a sublime state of uncertainty, and no person 
will be able to assert, with confidence, that he has ever seen or heard 
anything. There is a deep sacredness about the perceptions and 
senses of the sane mind, which, under some circumstances, it is well- 



X INTRODUCTION. 

nigh impious to question. If all testimony be ruled out relative to 
those subjects in which the race is most deeply interested, from what 
source are we to receive conviction ? Shall we file an eternal protest 
against the veracity of eye, ear, sensations and perceptions ? Has 
Nature failed to make them perfect in function ? If so, what shall 
supply their places ? 

My experience in detail it is not necessary that I should give ; be- 
cause, so far as physical phenomena are concerned, it would run par- 
allel with that of many others, who have borne public testimony 
relative to the same. I will proceed to make the following statements : 

1. That my hands have been moved by some power not legitimately 
my own. 

2. That that power possessed and manifested intelligence. 

3. That, by this agency, facts, of which I was previously ignorant, 
were written. 

4. That this invisible intelligence had the ability to respond in- 
stantly to mental interrogatories. 

5. That it could promptly correct an error, when I was fully per- 
suaded that none had been committed. 

6. That words, in a language with which I was not conversant, 
were formed with readiness, and with every evidence that the con- 
trolling agency was acting consciously, and with a given object in 
view. 

7. That this guiding influence posssessed knowledge beyond my 
own, was philosophical, — displayed reason and calculation. 

8. That my own individuality was perfect during the time, — all my 
personal peculiarities and characteristics remaining precisely as usual. 

9. That I could really detect, sense, and communicate as readily 
with the controlling power, as with a person in the body. 

10. That the perceptions and senses brought into action were en- 
tirely convinced of the presence and power of a spiritual being. 

11. That all the theories that can possibly be started can never 
fully satisfy a person thus acted upon that he has been the subject 
of unintelligible agents, hallucination, or demoniac possession. 

12. That such an experience would be quite sufficient to convince 
the most obstinate skeptic of the immortality of the soul. 

AYhat will religion and science do with facts like these ? Will the 
former overlook or pronounce them profane ; or will the latter hear 
with indifference? Can any truly rational and benevolent mind 



INTRODUCTION. XI 

really regret that suck experiences transpire ? Who is injured ? Does 
such intercourse degrade manhood ? Does it not rather exalt and 
endow the soul with new hopes and aspirations ? Does it not make all 
good men in the other world a moral police to restrain crime in this ? 

" It sets aside natural law," says one. 

Such a contingency never has occurred, and never will. Phi- 
losophy and science, in this and in the other sphere, are adapted to, 
and grow out of, law, and are adequate to all phenomena that have 
transpired, or will transpire. 

I have contemplated this interesting subject from every point of 
view. My convictions flow from evidence, which no sophistry can 
shake. I have not yet seen an explanation of the matter that even 
has the virtue of speciousness. Most of the so-called " exposures " 
and "theories" have not sufficient ingenuity to- merit my respect. 
Many are unfair and untruthful ; others utterly absurd, ridiculous, 
unworthy of attention. To me, mundane agency, when compared and 
measured with my personal experience, is a profane mockery of human 
hopes, inspiration, and the common God. All the immortal divinity 
incarnated in my being rises in rebellion, and places its foot upon such 
a blasphemous degradation of my highest nature. It is like attempt- 
ing to weigh diamond-dust upon hay-scales, or to use a stable-broom 
to clean a watch. There is an innate perception of truth in the 
Heaven-inspired soul, that rises high above the vagrant dreaming of 
half-fledged philosophers, or the hypocritical babblings of hoary 
superstition. There is a great moral power acting upon the minds of 
men, that will not be long retarded in its work, by misrepresentation 
and misconception. Internal forces are stronger than external, — the 
former must prevail. 

My experience commenced with mechanical movements of my per- 
son, and then passed onward to' the mental, phases. On a few occa- 
sions, I was favored with both at the same time ; but the mechanical 
soon ceased, and for over two years I have had but little of that kind 
of manifestation. Even when most under this singular influence, I 
have been fully conscious ; and, indeed, my consciousness has appeared 
to be more acute. 

When my mind has been wholly controlled by these agencies, my 
emotions have been of such a ^nature that they do not admit of 
description. Exalted joy, which language was too feeble to utter, has 
characterized my experience while in the superior condition. Inspi- 



XII INTRODUCTION. 

ration, from some source, has flowed into my brain, with a power and 
harmony that must be felt to be known, and which was full evidence, 
within itself, of the truth of a future existence. 

In the pages of this work I have attempted to describe an experi- 
ence of this kind, but have not succeeded in a manner satisfactory to 
myself. It is a subject on which I do not feel inclined to dwell, well 
knowing that it cannot be understood or appreciated by those whose 
organisms have not confessed a similar influence. "While my mental 
being has thus been the subject of super-mundane power, I have deliv- 
ered lectures, varying in length from one hour to two. Many, and 
the most impressive of these discourses, have been in private circles ; 
for, during the four years and a half that I have been engaged in the 
investigation of these matters, I have shunned notoriety, preferring 
to pursue the even tenor of my way, and make my deductions unbi- 
ased by what others might think or say. 

I have never seen these celestial visitants (I will venture to call 
them thus) save on one occasion, and that I shall cherish among the 
sacred and pleasant things of memory. The friends whom I had 
known in the body, exhibited to my inner vision a stronger outline of 
form and feature than those who were stranger in the flesh. 

My philosophical friends may call this hallucination, visionary, 
dreamy, &c; let it be so to them. I do not seek to influence their 
minds in the least ; but would respectfully ask if my earnest assurance 
is not as reliable as that of any one of the Jewish historians, or if my 
senses are not as capable of weighing, judging, and forming just con- 
clusions in relation to fhe importance to be attached to what is pre- 
sented for their consideration. I am quite aware that the popular 
shout will be against me ; but I am willing to bear my share of the 
opprobrium reserved for those who have manhood enough to be 
pioneers in this interesting field of investigation. . I shall pursue the 
subject with an unflinching determination to arrive at the truth, so 
far as circumstances will admit. I trust I shall have philosophy 
enough to remain calm and unmoved under the lash of ridicule, and 
the vituperations of fanatical anathema. 

I make no plea for senseless folly, put up no prayer for ignorance 
and superstition, whether detected. under the mask of spiritualism, in 
the churches, or any other place. I ^m not defending everything that 
passes under the name of manifestations ; but merely rendering my 
personal evidence, in hopes that it may be of service to some seeking 



INTRODUCTION. XIII 

and earnest soul. This work was dictated and written while my mind 
was in the passive or impressional state. The thoughts came with 
fluency and ease, and were written. How far they are a reflex of 
spiritual imagery and conception, I cannot say ; but this I know, 
they are valuable just so far as they are true, and incite the mind to 
higher aspiration and action, aud no farther. Therefore, this is, like 
all other books, to be weighed and judged by the standard of reason. 
I would place it in the hands of the reader with as little pretension as 
possible. I prefer that it should commend, or condemn itself, as the 
case may be. 

With feelings of this nature, I submit the work to the public eye, 
fervently hoping that God will pardon its errors, and bless its truths 
to the good of the reader. 

1 



INTRODUCTION. 



BY A. E. NEWTON. 

The author of this volume puts it forth under the modest claim 
that the greater portion of its contents " was dictated, spoken and 
written, while in the impressional state." Whatever may be implied 
in this claim, it is evident that he considers it as involving nothing 
marvellous or supernatural. On the contrary, as will be seen, he 
regards all things that transpire as entirety natural. Nor does he 
wish to be considered as in any sense a special instrument for any 
extraordinary work, or an exception to the universal laws that govern 
all organisms. 

Especially is it evident that, however extraordinary the method, by 
which this book has been produced, and however firm the author's 
convictions of the truthfulness and importance of the principles set 
forth in its pages, he does not ask or wish that a single idea or a single 
statement should be considered as authoritatively binding upon the 
reader's conscience, or as presenting any stronger claims to his con- 
sideration than the suggestions of any other ethical treatise. He 
wishes the book to be judged solely according to its intrinsic merits. 

Thus much in justice to the author. The writer of these intro- 
ductory pages, having familiarized himself with the phenomena of this 
"impressional state," both as exhibited in this author and in other 
individuals, desires to set forth his own convictions as to the true nature 
of these "impressional" experiences, and the relation they bear to 
certain phenomena which have been esteemed of the highest signifi- 
cance in past ages. 

To come at once to the point, he believes these impressional phe- 
nomena of our day to be precisely identical with the inspirational 
phenomena of the past ; and that, therefore, whatever is "dictated, 



XVI INTRODUCTION. 

spoken and written, in the impressional state," is, in fact, as truly 
" given by inspiration " as were any words or writings of the acknowl- 
edged sacred books. By this, however, he would not be understood 
as laying any greater claim to supernaturalism in this production 
than does the author ; for, in his view, inspiration is as natural to the 
human mind, when in the proper conditions, as are any of its suscep- 
tibilities. 

Many, however, will object to so commonplace a conception of what 
has hitherto been regarded as so mysterious ; while a large class will 
look upon any claim to modern inspiration as extreme presumption, 
if not downright blasphemy. 

The class referred to, however, do not hesitate to admit — nay, they 
most religiously believe — that in former ages of the world men have 
spoken and books have been written under the direction and control 
of some influence which they call Inspiration, and which, moreover, 
they believe emanated immediately from Deity himself ; which assump- 
tion far exceeds any modern pretensions that intelligent believers in 
spiritual manifestations put forth. 

That what has occurred at any previous period of human history 
may possibly transpire again, it will be useless for any rational mind 
to deny ; * and, consequently, it is the dictate of reason that this 
claim, when honestly and intelligently put forth, be submitted to a 
candid examination, and decided according to the evidence in the 
case, rather than the promptings of prejudice. 

No proposition can come home with greater force to a philosophical 
mind, than that like effects must be attributed to like causes — that 
whatever may have been the source of a certain class of phenomena 
in past ages, the like phenomena now occurring must be referred to a 
similar source. "We have, then, only to inquire, 1st, What were the 

* A shallow argument sometimes urged against modern inspiration was thought 
hardly worthy of notice here 5 but, as it is a serious stumbling-block to many, it may 
be well to put it out of the way. It is the anathema pronounced at the conclusion of 
the Revelation of St. John, in these words : "If any man shall add unto these things, 
God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book." On this it may 
be remarked — 1st, That the prohibition regards only additions by"ma?i,"and 
therefore can neither apply to God or his angels. 2d. It has reference only to addi- 
tions to that particular book which John had written — " the words of the prophecy 
of this book." Such additions, of course, would be a forgery. To stretch this into 
a denunciation of any further communications of divine truth to man, whenever God 
or angels see fit to make them, is, therefore, a most unwarrantable perversion of 
language. 



INTRODUCTION. XVII 

phenomena of inspiration in those times and persons in which it is 
admitted to have existed ? and, 2d, Have the like phenomena occurred 
in the experience of this author ? 

I. How was inspiration manifested in those supposed to be acting 
under its influence in ancient times ? It must be remarked that the 
information which has come down to us, on this point, is not of a very 
precise or definite character. No biblical writer has undertaken to 
furnish a careful, scientific detail of the physiological or psychological 
phenomena attending the super-mundane inbreathing. Says G-atjssex, 
" The influence which was exercised upon these men, and of which 
they themselves were conscious in very different degrees, has never 
been defined to us. Nothing authorizes us to explain it. The Scrip- 
tures themselves have never presented to us its mode or its measure 
as an object of study."* Nevertheless, there are occasional hints 
and allusions to individual experiences, which throw some light on 
the question, and enable us to form at least an outline idea of the 
general effects of the influence. 

1st. Inspiration, at least in its higher measures, was attended by 
an unusual or powerful internal impulse to speak or write. This is 
evidenced by the original derivation of the Hebrew word for prophet, 
which Prof. Stuart gives as " to pour forth, or pour out, that is, to utter 
one's internal excitement or inspiration ;" " to exhibit one's self as 
excited or inspired.'' f It is needless to specify the indications of this 
characteristic, as they are made evident in almost every case, of marked 
and special inspiration, from the songs of Moses and Miriam down to 
the sublime utterances recorded by John in Patmos. And this per- 
vading, powerful, out-gushing impulse to utter, to sing, to write, has 
ever been considered, of itself, an evidence to the subject of it, at least, 
of superior aid and control. 

2d. This inspiration has been marked by the suggestion and com- 
munication of thoughts and ideas above what were usual to the sub- 
ject of it in his ordinary condition ; and, in some cases, of knowledge 
of facts, past, present and future, beyond the normal reach of his 
powers. This will readily be admitted by all who believe in the 
inspiration of the writers of the Bible. 

3d. The subjects of this inspiration have often experienced an open- 
ing of the internal or spiritual senses, when they have seen and con- 

* Theopneusty, Kirk's Translation, p. Z-L. \ Stuart on Old Testament, p. 90, note. 

1* 



XVIII INTRODUCTION. 

versed with spiritual beings, who have claimed to bring them messages 
from the Deity, and who have often been described as "-men," or 
having the "appearance of men." The instances of this are too 
numerous to need specification, but some of the more remarkable of 
them are to Be met with in the experience of Ezekiel, * Daniel,f 
Peter,}: Paul,§ and John. 11 

4th. These inspired persons were often thrown into a condition of 
trance, in which their external senses and bodily powers were par- 
tially or totally suspended, while their spiritual senses were extraor- 
dinarily quickened. King Saul appears to have been entranced for 
a day and a night, on one occasion, when " the Spirit of God was 
upon him." IT Ezekiel, when beholding his visions, fell upon his face 
and was helpless.** Daniel was more than once " in a deep sleep on 
his face toward the ground." ft Paul, in describing his experiences 
on a certain occasion, was unable to tell whether he was in or out of 
the body ; tt and John lay " as dead " at the feet of the shining one, 
who opened to his sight the first of the gorgeous visions of the Apoc- 
alypse. §§ 

5th. Inspiration, nevertheless, in some of its highest exemplifica- 
tions, as in Elijah, Isaiah and Christ, appears to have been unattended 
by any extraordinary outward phenomena, but was manifested ever 
in connection with a calm, exalted, dignified employment of their 
normal powers. " The operation of their mental powers," says Dr. 
Dick, ", though elevated and directed by superior influence, was 
analogous to their ordinary mode of procedure." II II 

The foregoing observations are strikingly confirmed by the follow- 
ing, from the learned Kitto, which have been brought to the writer's 
notice since the above was penned : 

" The Hebrew word for a prophet is Nam, which comes from a 
word that signifies to boil up, to boil forth as a fountain, — and hence 
to pour forth words as those do who speak with fervor of mind, or 
under a Divine inspiration. The word, therefore, properly describes 
one who speaks under a peculiar fervor, animation, or inspiration of 
mind, produced by a Divine influence ; or else one who speaks, whether 

* Eze. 40 : 3, 4 5 43 : 6. TT 1 Sam. 19 : 23, 24. 

t Dan. 8 : 15, 16 ; 9 : 21 ; 10 : 5, 16 j 12 : 6. ** Eze. 1 : 23 j 2:2, etc. 

\ Acts 20 : 7, 8. , ft Dan. 8 : IS ; 11 : 9. 

' Acts 16 : 9 j 22 : IT, IS ^ 27 : 23. \\ 2 Cor. 12 : 2. 

1: 13, etc. §§Rev. 1 : 17. 

III! Essay vn the Inspiration of the Scriptures. 



INTRODUCTION. XIX 

hi foretelling future events, or in denouncing the judgments of God, 
when the mind is full, and when the excited and agitated spirit of the 
prophet pours forth the commissioned words as water is driven from 
the fountain. The very name, therefore, strongly manifests the con- 
straining power from above by which the prophets were moved, and 
through which they spake. 

" The prophet was not always in a state of inspiration, or infallible 
in all his words and conduct. We may trace error in the merely 
human conduct and speech of most of the prophets. It was only when 
they received special intimations of the Divine will, and felt that they 
were authorized to speak in the name of the Lord, that they claimed 
to be, or were ever deemed to be, inspired. 

" In regard to the mode in which the will of the Lord was imparted 
to the prophet, all inquiry is more curious than profitable. It may, 
however, be inferred, from the expressions used in Scripture, as well 
as from some distinctly recorded instances, that the most usual mode 
of communication was by means of immediate vision — that is, by the 
presentation to the prophet of the matter to be revealed, as if it were 
to the prophet an object of sight. If this were the common mode, it 
was not, nowever, the only one. Some things in the prophecies 
require us to suppose that they were made known to the prophet just 
as he made them known to others — by the simple suggestion of what 
he was to say, or by the dictation of the words he should utter. 

" A question has been raised as to the mental and bodily state of 
the prophet when under the influence of these Divine operations. Was 
he as fully in possession of his natural faculties, as completely master 
of himself, then, as at other times ; or was he, on the contrary, in a 
condition of ecstasy — in a state of passive subjection to a higher 
power, which held his own faculties in temporary but complete abey- 
ance ? Interpreters and readers, who come to the Bible with minds 
full of classic lore, remember that the prophets and diviners of the 
heathen world, during their seasons of pretended inspiration, exhibited 
the signs of outward excitement, even amounting to insanity ; and they 
are prone to seek signs of the same kind of rapture and entrancement 
in the Hebrew prophets. On the other hand, the early Christian 
writers, who lived in the times of paganism, speak of this intense and 
fr« izied excitement as specially characteristic of the delusive pagan 
inspiration , and point with gratification to the contrast offered by the 
caloiness, i;elf-possess.ion, and active intelligence of. the Hebrew proph- 



XX INTRODUCTION. 

ets ; and we think these were right. Look at the only instance in 
which Scripture places the demeanor of a prophet of the Lord in direct 
comparison with that of the heathen prophets ; and contrast the frantic 
excitement, the lea-pings and cries of the prophets of Baal, with the 
calm, dignified, and solemn attitude of Elijah. That there are in- 
stances of showing excitement under inspiration is not to be denied. 
But too much stress has been laid upon these special instances ; and 
an eminent divine,* who sees more of ecstatic movement in the Hebrew 
prophets than we are prepared to do, has yet supplied what appears to 
us the right rule of judgment in this case. He says, ' The state of ec- 
stasy, though ranking high above the ordinary sensual existence, is yet 
not the highest, as appears from Num. 12th chapter, and the example 
of Christ, whom we never find in an ecstatical state. To the prophets, 
however, it was indispensable, on account of the frailty of themselves 
and the people. This forcible working upon them of the Spirit of God 
would not have been required if their general life had been altogether 
holy ; for which reason we also find ecstasy, to manifest itself the 
stronger the more the general life was ungodly ; as, for instance, in 
Balaam, when the Spirit of God came upon him, and in Saul,t who 
throws himself upon the ground, tearing the clothes from his body. 
With a prophet whose spiritual attainments were those of an Isaiah 
such results would not be expected,' " £ 

It may further be remarked, before proceeding to our second in- 
quiry, that for the evidence of the existence of such phenomena as 
have been particularized we are obliged to depend almost solely on 
the statements of those who have claimed to be inspired. Being mainly 
experimental and internal, the peculiar physiological and psychologi- 
cal indications of inspiration can be consciously known only to the 
subjects of it ; and the value of their testimony must be estimated in 
accordance with the evidences of their sincerity, and their capacity to 
testify on a subject of this nature. Moreover, it may be important to 
notice that the records of ancient inspiration give no evidence of any 
constant phenomenal distinction between that which is alleged to be 
Divine and that which had its origin in other sources. There were false, 
as well as true, prophets, and " Scripture never denies [the former] a 
supernatural inspiration, nor bases the distinction of true ami false 
on physiological grounds.'' § The source of the suggestions, it would 

* Ilengsteuberg. [ Kilto's Bible Illustrations, art. Prophecy. 

T Numb. 24 : -1, 1G. § Beeeher's Review of Spiritual Manifestations, \>. 44 



INTRODUCTION. XXI 

seein, was to be inferred only from their character. The nature of 
the fountain was to be judged by the quality of- the streams it sent 
forth. 

II. We are now prepared to ask, Has the experience of the author 
of this work borne any analogy to the characteristics of mental exalt- 
at ion, or inspiration, as adduced in the foregoing authority ? 

His own testimony on this point * is, from the nature of the case, 
the best that could be given. "VVe find him testifying to, 1st, The 
inward impulse ; 2d, The suggestion of unusual thoughts and lan- 
guage ; 3d, The vision of, and converse with, spiritual beings ; 4th, 
A condition of partial trance ; 5th, A consciousness at times of a supe- 
rior directing influence, operating in connection with his own mental 
and physical powers. 

This testimony ought to suffice with all those who are content to 
receive the unendorsed statements of persons who lived and wrote 
many centuries ago. But, it should be remembered, furthermore, 
that the author is a living witness, whose character for probity and 
perspicacity is open for the scrutiny of all who care to inquire into it. 
And the writer of this, after a familiar acquaintance of many months, 
in which he has had occasion to see the integrity of the author sub- 
mitted to a variety of tests, is constrained to say that he has never 
met with a more thoroughly conscientious and devoutly truth-loving 
mind, and seldom with one so well fitted by natural capacity and 
educational acquirements to correctly judge of the nature of its own 
phenomena. Rigidly philosophical, and cautious overmuch, in all 
investigations, he has been often found questioning in regard to evi- 
dences which left no room for doubt in other minds ; and modest and 
retiring, even to a fault, he has been ever prone to undervalue what- 
ever is produced through his own instrumentality — consenting to the 
publication of the present work only after repeated urgencies. Others 
are ready to testify abundantly to the same facts. 

Moreover, it has been the writer's privilege to be a frequent witness, 
with others, to the manifestations of these phenomena ; and he cannot 
hesitate to pronounce them of the most marked and unquestionable 
character. The evidences of an independent controlling intelligence, 
acting within and speaking through his organism, have been at times 
overwhelmingly apparent. Discourses exhibiting a far-reaching intel- 
lect, a profound philosophy, and a most elevated diction, — and giving 

* See Preface, and chapter on u Personal Experience," p. 000. 



XXII INTRODUCTION: 

evidence of elaborate preparation, and access to means of knowledge 
not within his normal reach, — have been pronounced by his lips 
without forethought, and evidently as unexpectedly to the speaker as 
to the hearers. These discourses have professed, at times, to come 
from individual intelligences in a higher state of existence, and have 
borne, to the writer's judgment, indubitable evidence of such an 
origin. The utterances have been unattended by spasmodic or frantic 
action, but in all cases have been delivered in that calm, dignified, 
self-possessed, self-conscious and exalted manner, which has been truly 
indicated as characteristic of the highest form of inspiration.* 

Here, then, we have testimony to the recurrence of the same phe- 
nomena which are believed to have attended spiritual manifestations 
in the olden time ; and, moreover, since this is the testimony of living 
witnesses, whose probity and capacity are, or may be, matters of 
personal knowledge, it comes to us with surely as much conclusiveness 
as can reasonably attach to records of an ancient period. On ivhat ra- 
tional principle can the believer in ancient spiritual influx deny its 
recurrence in the present age 1 

But our argument, thus far, has had reference solely to the fact of 
inspiration — not to its source or authorship. 

As inspiration is simply an inbreathing of suggestions, thoughts, 
ideas, or words, into the spirit of man, it is manifest that it may come 
from any spiritual intelligence having access *to man, and ability to 
control the conditions. If it proceed from the Divine Mind, either 
directly or through the ministration of subordinate intelligences, 
angelic or disembodied human, divinely commissioned for our instruc- 
tion, it may be called Divine Inspiration, and will bear the stamp of 
its celestial origin ; but if, on the other hand, it proceed from intelli- 
gences inferior either in goodness or wisdom, its intrinsic character 
will infallibly indicate its source. Here is to be found the distinction 
between the true and the false. 

But, it may be asked, By what standard shall it be tried ? I 
answer, By the same to which similar claims have been submitted in 
all ages of the world. Do I mean the Bible ? No ; for the Bible has 
not always existed, and therefore could not always have been appealed 

* Lest the writer should be misunderstood as claiming an unjustifiable or exclusive 
distinction for Dr. Robinson, he would say that ho considers him as but" one of a now 
rapidly increasing number, who are the world's Now Teachers — the Prophets of tho 
Incoming Dispensation, 



INTRODUCTION. XXIII 

to. The time was when every truth contained in the Bible was new 
to the race, — else it was no revelation ; and consequently it could be 
tried by no previous written standard, for none existed. The contents 
of that volume have been made up from the words and writings of the 
very persons whose claims had to be tested. If there were true proph- 
ets in every age, there were also false ; and to what standard were 
they subjected ? Their own claims to Divine authority did not decide 
the question, for both true and false prefaced their utterances with 
"Thus saith the Lord." Nor were miracles a sufficient test, since 
there were true prophets who " did no miracle," and false ones who 
showed " great signs and wonders." * Yy r hat standard, then, had the 
people of ancient times, who selected the writings which form our 
" sacred volume," and rejected others — what rule had they by which 
to try the teachings of the inspired men of their day ? Plainly none 
but this — their own intuitive perceptions of what was right and true, 
just and proper, worthy of God and useful to man. Whether their 
perceptions led them in all cases to decisions which will stand the test 
of all time, is a question on which there may be differences of opinion ; 
but that men in this age are at least equally qualified to pronounce 
upon the character and source of inspired teachings, few will be 
disposed to question. 

It remains, then, that the reader of these pages form his own con- 
clusions as to the source and value of the author's experiences and 
writings. Let him judge them independently and rationally, not 
squaring them by creeds or prejudices, or gauging them by the 
measures of the past. Let him test them by that " true light which 
lighteth every man that cometh into the world," and carefully weigh 
them in the balances of his own God-given judgment. Let him sub- 
mit them to the standard of his own intuitions, which are the constant 
inflowing of the "inspiration of the Almighty," giving "understand- 
ing " to the human soul.f And if, subjected to this test, these teach- 
ings, or any portion of them, be deemed worthless or false, let them 
be rejected ; but, if they shall be found to present ideas worthy of 
God, true to your highest conceptions of His perfect and loving nature, 
salutary, exalting and ennobling to man, — then hesitate not to yield 
to their influence, that you may be profited thereby. 

+ Matt. 2i : 24. Rev. 13 : 13, 14. Exod. chaps. 7, 8, 9, etc. f Job 32 : 8. 



Boston, August, 1853. 
Dr. J. H. Robinson. 

Dear Sir : Having been privileged to listen to a number of essays and dis- 
courses, on theological and ethical topics, written or spoken by yourself, under, as 
you suppose, the dictation of superior intelligences, and believing them to set forth 
truths of the highest interest and moment to mankind, we unite in expressing an 
earnest desire that you would, at an early day, give the same to the public in a 
printed volume, in order that others may share the pleasure and profit which we 
have experienced. A E NEWT0 N, 

J. T. TROWBRIDGE, 
B. P. SHILLABER, 
WILLIAM SPOONER, 
JOHN S. ADAMS. 

Boston, August, 1853. 
Gentlemen : It has not been without considerable thought, and not a little reluc- 
tance, that I have consented to the publication of the essays and discourses referred 
to by you. Agreeably to your wishes, the necessary arrangements have been made, 
and the manuscript is now in the hands of the compositor. I am quite aware of the 
various misconstructions to which I subject myself by being brought before the pub- 
lic in this manner •, but, should the work succeed in affording either pleasure or profit 
to a class of minds like yours, I shall not regret any censure of which I may person- 
ally be the object, in consequence of taking this step. Some of the discourses alluded 
to never found external embodiment upon paper j but those thus preserved will 
appear. 
Thanking you, gentlemen, for your kindly expression of opinior, I remain 

Yours, truly, 

J. H. ROBINSON. 
A, E. Newton, J. T. Trowbridge, B. P. Shiilaber, 
William Spooner, John S. Adams. 



INVOCATION. 



Great creative Soul of the universe ! The brain 
which Thou hast formed to think directs its thought to 
Thee. The spirit which Thou hast developed to be an 
immortal intelligence turns to Thee for the elements of 
light which its nature demands. The hands which Thy 
wisdom have fashioned are raised to express the inward 
workings of the deathless mind. Father Sublime ! we 
know Thee but imperfectly. Our incipiently expanded 
faculties grope in the darkness of ignorance. Our erring 
feet wander amid the mountains of unbelief. We know 
not where to seek Thee ; or in what department of nature 
Thy soul breathes forth its most exalted strains of har- 
mony. We know not where lie, pictured in supernal 
beauty, the regions of eternal peace. "VVe know not how 
to arise from the foulness of earth's atmospheres to those 
calm skies where Thy serene respirations are most con- 
sciously felt. Bound to the rudimental by gross organ- 
izations, and impure affections, we cannot take the wings 
of faith and fly across the expanse to seek Thee in other 
creations, and to behold Thy majesty in manifestations 
far removed from mortal vision. 

We deplore our grossness. Our hearts faint within us 
when we contemplate the everlasting gulf between Thine 
own Almighty Spirit and ourselves. To Thee pertains 



14 INVOCATION. 

the stupendous inheritance of omnipotence. To Thee 
belongs the gift of eternal years. Within Thee are 
centred the elements of happiness, and the principles 
which evolve creations. Thou occupiest the sublime 
centre of all the lifes, harmonies and beauties. Thou 
art the only infallible heart that beats in the Univer- 
cselum. 

The potent pulsations of Thine essences and activities 
reach to every department of nature, imparting vitality 
to the grossest matter and the most ultimate of things ; 
but to us, incomprehensible Father, pertains weakness 
and mortality. While all Thy mysterious being is throb- 
bing with immortal light, and serene and ineffable pleas- 
ures permeate Thy divine substance, we are the victims 
of torturing doubt, of agonizing fear, and the pitiless 
pain of suspense. While Thou hast knowledge of all 
things, and lookest into the great future, even as Thou 
lookest back upon the mighty vestiges of Thine own eter- 
nal progress to the present, we are ignorant even of our 
own individualisms. 

Divine Father ! let Thy compassionate being be touched 
with our helpless weakness. Pity the frail organisms 
that endure but for a day. Smile beneficently upon the 
intelligences enshrined in temples doomed to dissolution. 
Throw upon rudimental existences some glorious ray of 
brightness, to illumine the dark pathway to the grave. 
Shine into the benighted places of the human soul, and 
light them up with a dazzling inspiration. Bring us into 
conjunction with those sources of wisdom which can sup- 
ply every want. Teach, 0, teach us the mysterious 
things of Nature. Lead us into the sacred laboratories 



INVOCATION. 15 

where she sublimates her most potent agents. Display- 
to our opened visions the chemicals -wherewith she oper- 
ates her mighty changes. Hold up to our sight the 
philosophy of continually acting laws, that sustain all 
things in harmonious positions and fixed movements. 
Reveal unto us the order of Nature's progressive stages. 
Let us perceive the science of her endless advancements, 
and assist our aspiring intellects to perceive Thee breath- 
ing through Nature in all her developments. 

We commend ourselves to the Wisdom which seeks for 
utterance in all living things. We commit our interests 
and our trusts to the ever-active Forming Principle. We 
cast ourselves, unreservedly, upon the clemency of that 
Power, who has operated all changes, called living souls 
out of chaos, and redeemed intelligence from matter. We 
stand silent and awed in the Presence that never sleeps 
or rests from His labors ; whose dwelling-place is Im- 
mensity , whose voice is Nature. 

Reforming and Guiding Will ! may it please Thee to 
bend from Thine azure firmaments, where Thy joy is 
undiminished ever, to lend a gracious and listening ear to 
the desires of mortal man. Let the smile of Thy radiant 
countenance penetrate to the centre and soul of our being, 
teaching us that truth w T hich will never die, that wisdom 
which can never grow old, that faith which can save, 
that love which is angelic, and that delight which is 
deathless. Fit our souls for the heavenly life. Elevate 
us to that intellectual and spiritual Manhood, where the 
thoughts of immortal intelligences can flow into our 
spirits in a sweet, tangible "and unceasing stream. Open, 
Sublime Creator, our interiors ! Grant unto us full, 



16 INVOCATION. 

complete and glorious evidence of the soul's immortality. 
Convey to us, in the language of Thine own out-gushing 
harmony, the consolations of the future home. Make us 
receptive of celestial delights. Stretch over us the un- 
tiring hands of Thy benevolence, and bless us always 
with a desire to bless others. Make our hearts expand 
towards the poor and miserable, in unostentatious acts of 
charity. May we follow Jesus to places of sickness and 
sorrow, to minister with our substance and our sympathy. 
May our consistent and practical lives preach daily ser- 
mons, until the time when our change shall come, and 
we shall pass to broader spheres of action. 

Impress us, always, with a portion of Thine ow T n truth, 
will and wisdom, that our footsteps may never falter in 
well-doing ; that our lives may be peaceful, our example 
worthy of imitation, our death triumphant, and our re- 
ception into the new heaven glorious. And, unto Thee, 
the beneficent Father and constant Preserver, will we 
ascribe those exalted paeans which emancipated spirits 
only can utter. 



THE 

RELIGION OF MANHOOD; 

or, 

THE AGE OF THOUGHT. 



THE PAST AND THE PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIN. 

The Past, Present and Future, are ours. We must, 
as immortal beings, mingle with the deep current of life 
flowing from the primal ages towards the illimitable sea 
of the future. We must float onward with the heaving 
tide. We must feel the motion of its billows here or 
hereafter, or both. There are no means of escape from 
the conditions of existence. We sustain relations to all 
who have gone before us. One great magnetic chain 
binds together all minds that have yet existed. Every 
heart that beats is but the continuation of the motions of 
the heart that preceded it. Every religious prejudice or 
impression leaves its signature upon some part of human- 
ity. We may feel to-day the effects of bad governments, 
and false notions of right and wrong, that swayed and 
agitated peoples and nations, ages ago. 



18 PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIN. 

The present generation of men will, in like manner, 
transmit their thoughts and actions to the generations to 
come. The high and holy prerogative is ours to judge 
the characters, deeds and motives, of the nations that 
have lived and died, leaving us the inheritance of their 
vices and virtues, as it will be of the ages to come to sit 
in judgment upon us. No age, no nation, no individuals 
are, or have been, so sacred, but the right is ours to in- 
vestigate their conduct, and to approve or condemn their 
acts. This privilege is heaven-born, and pertains to us 
as self-conscious and rational beings. By comparing the 
past with the present, we may learn whether humanity is 
progressive, or whether it is a stream that runs drier as 
the ages march on, and will finally cease to flow ; for, if 
the race be not progressive, the period must inevitably 
arrive, as a consequence, when human beings will dwindle 
to the proportions of dwarfs and idiots, and the w T hole 
phenomena of animated life entirely disappear. 

Singular thought ! that the great Master-Builder 
should begin, and not be able to finish ; that he should 
not have counted the cost of created worlds and or- 
ganized existences. 

How must we judge the past ? By learning what 
the past has accomplished for us — for the present and 
future. We must ascertain what high and holy examples 
it has left recorded for our imitation ; we must inquire 
what it has done for the arts and sciences ; we must 
examine the books which it has left us, — see what its 
highest ideal was, — what wise maxims it originated. — 
the history of its good men and its prophets, — its forms 
of government. 



PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIN. 19 

It is evident that the principles of right and wrong are 
not based upon any man, or set of men. Religion ex- 
isted before books were invented ; religion was not predi- 
cated upon books, but books upon religion. Inspiration 
did not first make its appearance in parchment, but flowed 
into the human soul through the divine mediation of 
Nature. Paper and parchment were never inspired, but 
men were. We are not to say, then, that the Past made 
religion or truth ; but that religion and truth moulded 
the Past, so far as its conditions would allow. Nature 
and Reason would have taught us a system of ethics, if 
the river of time had never floated into the current of the 
present a single parchment, manuscript, or book. 

The Father of Nature has not left us dependent upon 
any prophet, priest, king or personage, for those car- 
dinal doctrines which should shape our lives, and give 
an inspired coloring to our thoughts. Standing where we 
do, we can look back and feel conscious that w T e occupy a 
more elevated place upon the ladder of progression than 
the Jews ever did, in the days of their greatest glory and 
prosperity. We find that the men of the patriarchal and 
kingly ages will not compare in knowledge and in moral 
worth with the men of modern times. Solomon falls 
infinitely below the moral proportions of Washington. 
That magnificent sensualist might have been wise for that 
period ; but a man of his character, living in this gener- 
ation, would be branded a monster of wickedness. It is 
true that he was not a man of war, but he was more of a 
sensualist than Mahomet, passing nearly the whole of 
his life in luxurious indolence ; awakening only from his 
lethargy a short time previous to his death, to write a 



20 PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIN. 

few proverbs, in which he pours forth all the bitterness 
of a disappointed heart. 

George Washington, in his native and calm nobility 
of soul, was a head and shoulders taller than Solomon. 
David was doubtless better than most of those about him ; 
but Howard, the philanthropist, outshines him in the con- 
stellations of greatness and goodness. The former was a 
light to that age of the world ; but deeds like his com- 
mitted now would meet with the extreme penalty of the 
law as their legitimate reward. We would not cast con- 
tumely upon the name of that famous king, but we would 
let the light shine, that we may show the difference be- 
tween the past and the present. John White Webster 
slew a man in his wrath ; mercy did not present to him 
her sympathizing hand ; and justice, so called, deprived 
him of that which it could not restore ; yet we could 
indicate acts far more reprehensible which were not thus 
punished. 

David might have been a man more "after God's 
heart 77 than any of his subjects; but to affirm that he 
was a man precisely " after God's heart 77 would be a 
misrepresentation, unless Deity looks with complacency 
upon the commission of crime. Lot may have been a 
good man, relatively speaking; but, existing under the 
conditions of to-day, we fear he would not be admitted to 
church fellowship and communion. And yet this does 
not conflict with the fact that he was better than the 
imbruted inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah. 

In the character of Moses there was something grand 
and lofty ; he was a thousand times greater than most of 
the kings and prophets who lived after him. Yet Jeffer- 



PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIX. 21 

son, Madison, Calhoun, Clay and Webster, were greater, 
as law-givers, than he; while as philosophers, Socrates, 
Plato, Diogenes and others, were more loving. But 
we must allow that there was a stern sublimity, an 
inexorable fixedness of purpose, a deep and solemn trust 
in "Jehovah," that must forever distinguish Moses from 
all other religious chieftains. He was truly great, — just 
the man for that age. His intellectual power was 
mighty, and reflected through his face the radiance of 
internal illumination. The character of Moses looms up 
in the plain of the past like a huge, towering rock of 
granite, awing the beholder with its invincible sternness ; 
forming an imperishable landmark, to which the present 
and the future can turn with wonder. He was the man 
of iron for that age of iron — the man of force for that 
age of force. 

In looking over the receding panorama of the past, we 
find but one truly green spot in the desert of its history, 
upon which to gaze with true and elevated joy. The 
difference from Moses to Jesus is just the difference be- 
tween a marble statue and full Manhood. The one may 
represent cold, stony Justice, and the other warm, gush- 
ing Mercy. Standing in the middle of the ages, Jesus 
makes another landmark to preach forever the doctrine of 
the progression of the human race. Moses represents 
the age of expediency, but Jesus the age of Manhood. 
Who cannot discover the wide difference between the first 
and the last ? and who that makes this discovery can do 
otherwise than admit that man is a progressive being'? 
And, if man is a progressive being, Adam was less per- 
fect than Moses, and Moses less perfect than Jesus ; and 



22 PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIN. 

so must the ages have been of which they were the 
representatives. 

If this self-evident doctrine be admitted, then the first 
man must have been inferior to the second, the second to 
the third, and so on through successive generations. 

The first type of human intelligence was as good as it 
could be, or as Deity could make it, under the circum- 
stances ; and Manhood has been rising in the scale ever 
since. Misdirection had its punishment then, as it does 
now, and ever will. The original sinners were punished 
for original sins, just as we are punished for violating the 
laws of Manhood to-day. Every person is now in God's 
Eden as much as was the primitive man, held according 
to capacity and conditions, to the same responsibilities and 
duties. 

The great natural religion began to be developed 
when the first heart began to beat ; and inspiration 
visited the first brain that began to think, during its first 
thought, even as it will visit the last. The Gospel was 
preached by the first atom that obeyed its attraction and 
went upward, for it carried good tidings of refinements 
and transformations that were to go on forever, and recon- 
cile all things to God. True religion opened her lips 
and spake, when the first act of charity was performed ; 
and the sublime soul of Deity made music and was glad. 

Men were inspired to do good, and then wrote about 
their inspiration ; and this scripture or writing trans- 
mitted to us is evidence to the fact that the authors ivere 
inspired ; but it makes no new truth, for all truth existed 
prior to the faculty of recording it. This is proof positive 
that the Bible is not the foundation of truth ; but, so far 



PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIN. 23 

as it is true, it is dependent for its support and basis upon 
truth antecedent to itself; otherwise, the truths con- 
tained in that book were not truths until after they had 
flowed through the nib of a pen, and taken form upon 
paper. 

The principles of mathematics really existed before 
there was a computation of numbers. It is impossible, in 
the nature of things, that twice three should make any 
more or any less than six ; and religion is just as eternal 
and natural in its elements. If Adam or Eve in their 
mathematical deductions made trwiee three seven, neither 
you nor I are responsible for the error, and it would be 
highly unjust that we should be punished for it. We are 
punished for the sins of Adam, Abraham, David or Sol- 
omon, just so far as the consequences of their sins are 
reflected to us in the long chain of reciprocal influences. 
If the first President of the United States governed 
unwisely, we suffer in the same ratio as that government 
brings to us, in the legitimate way, the burden of its mis- 
direction and wrong. The original sins of George the 
Third degrade us more than the original sins of the first 
man ; because the nearer v/e are to causes, the more 
forcibly we feel the rebound of effects. This is a law of 
philosophy which philosophers cannot well dispute. There 
is but little doubt but his Brittanic majesty sinned against 
the colonies more than the first type of manhood sinned 
against the race. 

Humanity is like a fountain bursting into a river, 
wearing its own channel through the soil of time ; it 
must run muddy at first, but it will eventually wash 
away, by its own force, its own impurities. We stand in 



24 PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIN. 

the middle of the stream, and its impure waters are flow- 
ing to us from the past ; but we see that they are clearer 
than formerly, and come less tinged with the dirt of their 
first efforts to flow on and form a bed. Some indications 
of the original impurities may be observed, but that need 
cause us no alarm. The river of the past, swelled by 
the purer springs of the present, will wear a broad and 
glorious channel for the future ; and the life-barks of all 
nations will float on its bosom in safety and tranquillity. 
We have no reason to complain of what Adam, or Eve, 
or Cain, or Thomas Paine, or anybody else, have done, to 
perturb the river of the Past. God holds us responsible 
to the present only. The soul that sinneth against its 
own nature dies, according to inexorable law. To his 
own master must every man stand or fall. While we sit 
weeping over the sins of the first man, we are sinning 
grievously against the last. While we a*re asking our 
Father to forgive us for the wrongs of another age, we 
are wronging this. It is solemn mockery to implore God 
to forgive those evils which by no possible law, logic or 
philosophy, can be attributed to us, while we remain 
silent and dumb upon the subject of those evils which we 
are daily committing against our neighbors and ourselves. 
The end and aim of life is to do good, not to lament over 
what we cannot remedy if we would, and what God would 
not if He could, or does not if He can. Our business is 
to awake from the sleep of idleness which has fettered 
our souls, and do something to make society better and 
happier. No matter about ourselves, in one sense of the 
word; for, in doing good to humanity, we more than bless, 
we glorify ourselves, even with the same glory where- 



PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIN. 25 

with Jesus was glorified. We have fought what w T e can- 
not help — original sin — long enough; it is now time 
that we should fight against human selfishness. We must 
enter upon a new battle-ground j and our w r eapons must 
be mighty only through the truth. Our watchword must 
be charity, engraved upon all our armor, and written 
upon our banners. Our arms must all be wrought from 
the true steel of love. We will smite the misdirected 
and ignorant with the spear of kindness and the battle- 
axe of wisdom, dealing no wounds that cannot be healed 
with words of gentleness. Our conquests shall help to 
swell the glory of the future. It is quite as proper to 
talk of the original nature, or original virtue, as original 
sin. According to the orthodox genealogy, total deprav- 
ity is the offspring of original sin, and is a child every 
w r ay w r orthy of its sire. We have just as much authority 
to speak of the total goodness of mankind, as of the total 
depravity of the race. When we consider the divine 
origin of the human intelligence, we must be forced to 
feel that there is more of good than of evil in his nature ; 
hence it would be much more appropriate to preach ser- 
mons about his total goodness. It is obviously a libel 
against the Creator to affirm that His works are wholly 
bad, or that he failed to produce just such a being as He 
desired. 

Man is the highest effort of the divine ideal, and wo 
should pause and reflect deeply before pronouncing him 
completely vile. We have no more right to slander the 
works of God, as displayed in humanity, than w T e have to 
say that the sun does not perform well its appointed duty 
The same Being that causes that luminary to visit us in 



26 PAST AND PRESENT — ORIGINAL SIX. 

rays of heat and light, built up the immortal fabric of the 
human spirit ; it is His, and He will watch over and care 
for it, in the fulness of his paternal benevolence. 

Spiritual power flowed into the past as benignantly as 
conditions would allow, and made it as harmonious as it 
could. Spiritual power is flowing into the present more 
fully, because the race has progressed, making the con- 
ditions better ; consequently, the Eiver of Time must 
make a wider channel, and roll on more harmoniously 
than heretofore. If our Father is content with his 
labors, it were presumptuous and impious for us to call 
his wisdom in question. That which is faintly under- 
stood by us is fully comprehended by Him. That which 
profane superstition pronounces accursed He pronounces 
blessed — blessed for evermore. We may, in our short- 
sighted folly, quarrel with Nature and Reason ; but He 
glorifies both with a brightness which shall never fade. 
When we blaspheme Nature, we blaspheme God's tem- 
ple ; and when we mock at Reason, we revile His best 
gift to mortals. 

Amid all the jars and cliscords of nations and commu- 
nities, Deity walks calmly forward, with His face turned 
serenely towards the future. He knows that the period 
approaches when the music of His own harmonious soul 
shall hush up all the tumults of His children ; when war 
and hatred shall be no more, and peace shall sit tri- 
umphant in the councils of the nations. The Present is 
more conscious of the Deity than the Past, and the 
Future will be more conscious of Him than the Present. 



t 



THE TRANSFORMATIONS. 

All organizations are the subjects of a singular change. 
The different parts no longer perform their functions, 
and the motions cease. This change is called Death. 
Not only do animals, and man, the highest organization, 
pass this mysterious ordeal, but all the forms of vegetable 
life also die. The flower that blushes in the valley, and 
the oat that flourishes by the rivers of water, yield ai 
length to the eternal law that governs all development. 
The fluids cease to circulate in the sap-vessels, — the 
branches no longer put forth leaves, — the blossom falls, 
— the bark decays, — and the whole ultimately yields to 
the different attractions and repulsions, and mingles again 
with the elements. The tree and the flower have no 
longer tangible form among the vegetable organizations ; 
they exist in gases, in air, and in earths, and are ready 
to feel new attractions and repulsions, and to be remoulded 
into other creations. What they have been is known to 
the outward senses of man ; but what they shall be doth 
not yet appear to his vision. They shall be what the 
Divine Mind intended when He commenced the series of 
changes; they shall result in higher and more perfect 
manifestations. 

The principles of life and motion within them shall not 
be lost in the vast fields of nature. Creative wisdom will 



28 THE TRANSFORMATIONS. 

gather and combine anew all the perfecting elements ; 
nothing shall be lost, but something gained ; for every 
new formation produces a result, and that result is a step 
in the order of progression. 

It is thus with animals ; like the vegetable, they minister 
to the transformations above them. The vegetable king- 
dom elaborates principles necessary to the perfection of 
the animal; and the latter, in turn, supplies an indis- 
pensable want in the human fabric. 

It is thus that Nature flows from the lower forms of 
matter to the higher, with undeviating regularity. It 
affords a philosophical pleasure to thinking minds to 
contemplate her ascending steps : they behold beau- 
ties in the continual unfoldings of her inexhaustible re- 
sources which others fail to recognize. It is not intended 
to be affirmed that the interior essences of the vegetable 
have any higher resurrection than in the circulating fluids 
of the animal that takes them into its organism ; b.ut in 
that connection they supply a want without which an 
animal could not exist. It is in this manner that the 
vegetable kingdom forms an important link in the ascend- 
ing developments, while the lower animals sustain much 
the same relation to the higher. 

The animal perishes like the tree or the flower; but 
its interior elements remain fixed facts in Nature, and 
furnish just so much material to be appropriated to 
higher uses in the creative economy. There is inde- 
scribable harmony in the upward tendings of all things. 

*f? «& -f? H$ »7V 'N" 

The human organization obeys the general law of the 
creations, and dies. Disease lays its hand heavily upon 



THE TRANSFORMATIONS. 29 

the mortal form, and it withers ; it is like autumn to the 
leaves, — like winter to the flowers, — like snow to the 
grass, — like ice to the sunny lakes. — like frost, that 
locks up the earth. The central, propelling organ — the 
heart — ceases its contractions and expansions ; the vital 
fluids freeze in the sanguineous vessels ; the muscles are 
no longer subject to the nerve-centres ; and the will no 
longer acts upon them to produce motion. The snow of 
death's winter falls coldly upon the countenance; the 
flowers of its beauty fade ; the summer of life has 
passed, and its harvest of earthly hopes ended. The brain 
has ceased to send forth its commandments to the obedient 
members ; it will utter to them its still, small voice of 
power no more. The fire in the lungs has gone out. and 
can never be rekindled. The living soul no longer looks 
out upon the external world through the eyes ; the ears 
are deaf to sounds, and no longer convey impressions to 
the thinking principle. Death sits triumphant over the 
human body when contemplated after these mysterious 
changes. 

Cold and stupid philosophy says the dream of life is 
over, the brief conflict after fame and happiness ended ; 
the hopes have perished, the wisdom gone, the ambition 
departed, like the vapors that fly before the approaches 
of the morning sun. The learned doctor turns away 
from the inanimate clod with a sigh ; he believes that he 
has seen the finale of the grand illusion; that he has 
watched the panorama through its varied scenes from 
the cradle to annihilation. He has searched the convolu- 
tions of the brain in vain, to find the seat of an immortal 
principle. The scalpel has failed to reveal such a truth : 



30 THE TRANSFORMATIONS. 

it lias thrown no light upon the subject. It seems to 
exclaim, "There is no immortal spirit; it exists only 
in the brain of the enthusiast ! If a man die, he shall 
not live again ! J? 

But there is a science infinitely higher than that taught 
in the schools ; there is an inspiration that giveth under- 
standing ; an intuition which is far-seeing ; a philosophy 
which searches into the nature of things; a faith grounded 
upon analogies ; an all-powerful voice which speaks every- 
where in nature, of uninterrupted developments. The 
immutable finger of truth points significantly upward, 
and declares, in tones like the utterance of many waters, 
that there are no real deaths in the universe — they are 
changes of form, and not the end of progress. We die 
in the external, to live more perfectly in the internal. 
The time approaches, doubtless, when this will be more 
fully understood, and apparent death regarded as a 
friend, and not as a pitiless enemy ; when it shall be 
recognized as a servant of God and Nature, to unfold the 
bud and develop the more perfect flower. 

Dark horrors will no longer cluster about the grave. 
Tears shall cease to flow, and Sorrow fold up her sombre 
wings ; for Death is swallowed up in life, and the tomb 
is the gateway to immortality. 

What is it, then, to die ? It is to be born again ; to 
pass from the external to the internal ; to dissolve 
the connection between the mortal and the immortal — 
the gross and the spiritual ; to exchange an old garment 
for a new ; beauty for deformity ; the earthly for the 
heavenly. 

But when shall this important change take place ? At 



THE TRANSFORMATIONS. 31 

what hour will the " corruptible put on incorruption " ? 
Will it be after the lapse of many years ? Will it be after 
the mortal form has been mingling with its mother earth 
for numberless ages ? Will it be after the ceaseless mo- 
tions of time have made a mighty interval between the 
laying off of life and its resumption ? 

We answer : There is no cessation of existence ; the 
immortal heart of the spirit will beat on forever. The 
death of the body is the birth of the real man. The 
writhings and contortions of the dissolving frame are the 
inevitable attendants of the process, without which the 
birth could not take place ; the pain of the body is the 
travail of the soul, and another wonderful process in the 
ascending scale of development. 

Over this mysterious transformation invisible intelli- 
gences preside ; they are the ministers that usher the 
new-born spirit into the scenes of its future home. Their 
fingers point the wondering soul to the regions of its eter- 
nal pilgrimage ; it is their voices that give it its first 
instructions, and whisper words of consolation. It is 
often the case that the interior vision of the subject under- 
going the transformation is opened to behold the benevolent 
faces that have come to smooth down the agonies of the last 
moments of earthly existence. Dying is not invariably 
attended with that acute suffering which the difficult 
respiration, the heaving chest, or the convulsed limbs, 
w T ould seem to indicate. It is true, that near the end of 
the struggle an indescribable serenity pervades the mind; 
it rises above the circumstances of the body, and triumphs 
in its own innate immortality, having already a foretaste 
of its future career. Nature is wise in all her operations: 



32 THE TRANSFORMATIONS. 

she is a consummate chemist ; the Universe is her labora- 
tory ; she is engaged in endless sublimations ; she makes 
no retrograde movements ; every process is to refine, and 
every new transformation is higher than that which pre- 
ceded it. The electricities are the most potent of all her 
chemicals ; her crucibles are found in all places, and she 
works matter into forms by the intervention of those far- 
reaching agents whose attractions and repulsions are like 
the breath of the Almighty. 

The spirit of man emerges, at last, from the body, in 
obedience to the laws which govern Nature's grand 
scheme of refinements. Nature is the handmaiden of 
God; she goes forth to do his bidding; she works in 
beauty and in power ; she operates her transformations 
with unerring certainty; her attractions and repulsions 
are established things ; they act with the same precision 
and certainty in one case that they do in another ; they 
operate as truly upon the smallest atoms, as upon the 
mightiest earths ; they govern as wisely at death, as at 
birth. 

Nature, like God, is omnipresent ; but God only is om- 
nipotent. Nature is the servant of God — God the Great 
Master. Nature w r orks everywhere, and God commands 
as universally ; she works as harmoniously in apparent 
death as in life. There is as high a wisdom in the trans- 
formations as in the first developments. All things work 
together for good. The voice of Nature is sublimest 
harmony, and God sets it to eternal music ; it sings as 
sweetly when the human organism dissolves, as when the 
affinities aggregated its constituents ; it utters as glorious 
a shout when the freed spirit rises to more refined atmos- 



THE TRANSFORMATIONS. 33 

pheres, as when it ascended from lower forms to animate 
the human ; she smiles as benignantly when the elements 
again claim the gross, cast-off tenement, as when she 
fashioned it cunningly in the maternal bosom. 

Nature, then, is eternally right, because she performs 
the holy commandments of God ; she cannot stop nor 
stay; she will not pause to rest; her work is never done, 
and she is never weary in her transformations ; her rest 
is sweetest in activity — sublimest'in unceasing labor: 
her Sabbath has never come ; she operates in the min- 
erals ; she refines the earths ; she transmutes the gold ; 
she forms crystals with curious angles, and prismatic 
powers ; her omnipresent hand lays the silver in veins, 
and deposits inexhaustible beds of coal ; she arranges her 
chemicals in the caverns of the sea ; she seeks form in 
the coral, and in the drooping stalactites of the grottoes ; 
she finds utterance in the thread-like fibres that are 
spread out beneath the surface of the ground; she aspires 
to higher development in those plants that rise above the 
surface, and are acted upon by the light, and other agents 
that she cannot bring to bear upon the lower strata of the 
soil. And thus she goes on with her endless transforma- 
tions, until man stands forth, her highest work, to be the 
subject of yet another change, which shall place him in 
new relations, and expand his faculties for ever and ever. 

The last transformation is the most glorious of all ; it 
conveys man to another region of action ; it brings him 
more into connection with the causes of things, and 
mightier influences act upon him. He is now able to 
. think more rapidly ; to enjoy more perfectly ; to act more 
wisely ; to gaze more philosophically upon the movements 



34 THE TRANSFORMATIONS. 

of the creations around, above and below him. With a 
calm serenity of soul, the unfolded man searches into the 
operations of Nature, and experiences an exalted joy in 
contemplating the manifestations of the Divine Mind. 
He blesses the Cause of all causes that has made him 
what he is ; he lays his hand upon his immortal heart, 
and exclaims, " Father, I love Thee!" He sees all 
things in motion ; he perceives that activity is the order 
of the creations ; he discovers no idlers among his brother 
intelligences ; he sees developed minds engaged in bless- 
ing those beneath them, even as the benevolent Deity 
blesses all beneath Him; and he says, "I, too, will 
work ; I will assist in the transformation of minds ; I 
will seek those whom I can aid, and impart to them that 
which I have received from those more advanced in wis- 
dom ; I will echo the great voice of the Father, which is 
onward — onward ; I will do for minds less wise that 
which I desire wiser intelligences to perform for me.' 5 



GOD IS NO RESPECTER OF PERSONS. 

It has been a fatal error, in all ages of the world, that 
God is a respecter of persons ; that He blesses some 
minds more particularly and abundantly than others ; 
that some ^>f His creations He hates, and others He loves. 
Individuals and nations have alike fallen into this miscon- 
ception, but can assign no other reason for their deeply- 
rooted belief, than that it is thus, and consequently is 
right ; because the Divine Being cannot be guilty of a 
wrong. The Jews imagined that they were a favored 
and ''peculiar people ;" that for them the Almighty set 
up the pillars of the earth, and stretched out the heavens : 
that for them He caused His sun to shine, and His rain 
to fall: that for them He treasured up His love, and 
poured out the vials of His wrath upon other nations ; 
that He fought for them with the sword of His indig- 
nation, and ministered to them only of His Spirit. 

Human pride and selfishness united in strengthening 
this palpable falsehood ; in confirming them in an error 
which was a foul libel upon the goodness of Deity. This 
narrow view of the principles of Divine government 
prevented them from mingling harmoniously with neigh- 
boring nations, and realizing the blessings which flow 
from commerce and community of interest. It was the 
Lucifer that inflated them with self-conceit — the serpent 



36 GOD 13 NO RESPECTER OF PERSONS. 

that wound its poisonous coils around their 'vitals — the 
great dragon that destroyed their usefulness, an everlast- 
ing stain upon their greatness. They did not, and would 
not, acknowledge the brotherhood of man, or the Father- 
hood of God. The idea that the Creator was a re- 
specter of persons and nations, had its origin far back in 
past ages, and has been cherished by the churches and all 
religious organizations ever since. It is a moral incubus, 
weighing upon the footsteps of progression, — a malig- 
nant ulcer, gnawing at the heart of humanity, — a poi- 
sonous virus circulating through the veins of the nations, 
— a leprosy which contaminates, more or less, all theo- 
logical bodies, — a sin which does a work of sorrow under 
the sun. 

God , governs the universe by inexorable law. The 
principles of His government are based upon wisdom ; they 
need no amendment, — no shadow of turning. They are, 
and must be, the same through all time to come. They 
will not bend to human caprice, or step aside to gratify 
human folly. They will not suspend their action in 
answer to human desire, or to please and flatter human 
pride. The laws which governed the universe yesterday 
will govern it to-day and to-morrow; and those which 
governed organisms in past generations, will govern them 
during the present, and while organisms shall continue 
to be. 

The "Jehovah" of the Jews was the God of the 
whole earth; "the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob," 
was the God of all existences. Favoritism was never 
known in the Divine bosom ; the children of light and the 
children of darkness are the creations of the same Deity ; 



GOD IS NO RESPECTER OP PERSONS. 37 

they are the "offspring of one Father, differing only in 
condition. Conditions may change; but God, never. 
The churches are deeply imbued with this fundamental 
wrong. The spirit that cries out " Stand aside, I am 
holier than thou ! " is found in religious organizations ; it 
clogs the wings of their sublimest prayers, and is appar- 
ent in all their communications with their brethren who 
do not subscribe to the same creeds. * Those within the 
pale of the churches are proud of their sanctity ; they 
speak of themselves as " saints," and of those whose 
names are not enrolled on their covenants of faith as 
" sinners." They believe God is a respecter of persons ; 
that He attends their footsteps with peculiar care, and 
turns with unkindness from those not found within the 
area of prescribed limits. They have yet to learn that 
the eternal Father blesses all men the same, when condi- 
tions are the same. 

A certain prophet prophesied against a great city ; Nin- 
eveh was not destroyed, and the prophet was angry. But 
the prophet's anger was the prophet's folly; for God did not 
respect his grief, or change his purposes. The immuta- 
bility of Deity is engraven on revolving systems, and 
traced by His finger upon the scripture of the universe. 

No sun will be blotted out because human folly desires 
it ; no star will be dimmed because blind fanaticism de- 
mands it ; no lightnings will be darted from the skies to 
blast unbelievers, because ignorance invokes it. There is 
a law that governs prayer. True prayer will never sin 
in its requests ; it will bless the soul with elevated 
thought — with holy communion — with all that is high. 
It will bless, and curse not. It is humble, in its voices. 
4 



38 GOD IS NO RESPECTER OF PERSONS. 

and submissive in its attitudes. It feels that all are alike 
erring ; and that the Father is impartial in His dispensa- 
tions. The state of prayer is an exalted condition ; and 
where conditions are the same, eternally will results be 
the same. 

A pure and peaceful life is a continual prayer, in 
answer to which the angels of peace bow their wings and 
whisper words of consolation. Every personality may 
attain to the condition of prayer, when the organism will 
be like a nicely-attuned instrument of music, yielding 
sweet harmony to the touches of charity. 

The churches have yet to learn, practically, as well as 
theoretically, that God despises none of his creatures ; 
that the salvation of one cannot interest Him more than 
that of another. His voice, uttered in every department 
of nature, proclaims the great truth of His impartiality. 
It is the spirit of self-righteousness only that prays God 
would bless " His children 7 " 7 (meaning those who belong 
to some particular church and have subscribed to certain 
articles of faith), for all men are His children, and the 
universe is His church. He will no longer write His laws 
upon tables of stone ; He will not even write them upon 
the musty parchments of the churches ; but He will 
trace them everywhere, among all nations, in hearts that 
are humble, and upon minds that seek to do good. 

Jesus gave evidence, during his ministry, that He. like 
the Father, was no respecter of persons. Wherever He 
found a work of mercy to perform, He performed it, with- 
out pausing to ask questions about doctrines and creeds. 
Wherever He saw miserable men and women, there He 
recognized his brethren of the great family of God 






GOD IS NO RESPECTER OE PERSONS. 39 

Wherever He perceived the degraded and the sinful, He 
beheld those having the same claim to the fatherhood of 
God as the most favored ones under heaven. In rebuk- 
ing the proud and the hypocritical, who occupied import- 
ant places as religious instructors, He shewed Himself 
equally the friend of all. His solemn reproof fell upon 
their ears like the voice of an accusing angel, — like the 
tones of one "who knew them, but feared them not. The 
reverberations of the thunder were a thousand times less 
awful than the clear, impressive, warning voice of the 
Nazarene. Their pretensions to holiness, and the vain 
show and magnificence of the outward adornments of 
their persons, were in no wise respected by Him who 
4 'knew what was in man." 

Thus will it ever be. There will be no deviation from 
the line of eternal rectitude which the hand of Omnipo- 
tence hath drawn. Ages will roll on, and His love will 
not be dimmed or His wisdom diminished. He will bless 
his children then as He blesses them now, and has 
blessed them in the past. He will flow into harmonious 
souls, and whisper peace to all their thoughts. He will 
visit the pure, and they shall see Him in His manifesta- 
tions. He will knock at the hearts of the charitable, 
and will sup with them in joy. He will, as He 
has ever done, make conditions easy to all; He will 
require only what a man hath, and not that which 
he hath not. He will be a kind, a considerate, a reason- 
able, a rational, a loving, a just, a sublime God. The 
poor and the heart-broken shall be as precious in His 
sight as the rich and the merry. The sick shall recognize 
in Him a physician ready to heal ; the despairing, a com- 



40 GOD IS NO RESPECTER OF PERSONS. 

forter; the penitent thief, a compassionate judge; the 
prodigal son, a gentle father ; and no living soul upon the 
broad earth shall find in Him an enemy. He never was. 
He never will be, the enemy of the human race. He is 
one that rejoices in all mundane advancement. He 
watches over the development of life and consciousness, 
with a benevolent care which cannot be known. He be- 
holds the ascending transformations with a benign satis- 
faction which passeth human thought. He gazes from His 
transcendent heavens, "upon the incipient organizations, 
and breathes over them the breath of His animating power. 
He stretches out His paternal arms to encircle all crea- 
tions. 

There are moments when the soul may feel the ou.t- 
gushings of His spirit, and bow, in tears of joy, to worship 
His boundless kindness. There are seasons when 
the immortal intelligence would fain lift itself on the 
wings of strong desire, to sun itself in the smiles of Om- 
nipotence. There are epochs in the developments of the 
inner life, when the imprisoned angel feels weary of its 
earth, and longs to pass to the cloudless skies of the 
Father's love. There are eras in the awakenings and 
quickenings of the undying mind, when it rejoices and 
sings a song of harmony, that He is impartial, — never 
changes, never falters, but walks onward, everlastingly 
onward, through the years of His eternity, blessing, un- 
ceasingly blessing, but never, never cursing the smallest 
atom of life that pulsates in the wide universe. 

The goodness of God leads men to repentance ; and 
hopeful indeed is that melting of the soul produced by 
contemplating the character of Deity. When created 



GOD IS NO RESPECTER OF PERSONS. 41 

existences shall be so expanded by the genial rays of that 
all-pervading Sun as to know Him as He is, earth will 
present no attraction so great as to make them fear the 
valley of death, or to ask a longer residence in the rudi- 
mental world. Let the angels sing a new song, up and 
down the dark places of the earth, — let it be heard by 
every child of God: "The Almighty Father is no re- 
specter of persons, but will bless all minds, now and for- 
ever, even as they seek to be blessed.' 7 ' May men pray 
everywhere and say, "Our Father, thy will be done ! 
May the spirit of Jesus shine brightly upon the churches, 
and rest lovingly upon all hearts ! May selfishness no 
longer triumph over souls, and sanctified pride be 
scourged from the temple of judgment to the Calvary 
where it must be crucified ! May love be enthroned in 
all minds, and bigotry find nowhere a spot on which to 
erect its temple ! Then shall the peace of mortals be as a 
river, and their righteousness as the waves of the fathom- 
less sea ; then shall the habitation of God be with men, 
and they shall be his people ; then shall the new Jerusa- 
lem come down out of heaven, and there shall be neither 
sighing nor sorrow, and tears shall be wiped from all 
faces ; there shall be no night of pain, nor day of afflic- 
tion ; for wisdom shall reign on the earth, and put all 
wrongs under her feet." 
4# 



OUE FATHER. 

Let us wander among created worlds ; let us perform 
apilgriinage amid the regions of the stars ; let us re- 
spire the atmospheres of other systems, and contemplate 
the movings of infinite power beneath the wide arches of 
other heavens. Our vision sweeps the measureless depths 
of space. We behold myriad suns 3 the centres of as 
many systems of worlds, bound forever to perform their 
part in the operations of the stupendous whole, by 
immutable laws. 

We perceive the suns dispensing seas of light, to be 
reflected from planet to planet, and from earth to earth. 
In contemplating these innumerable creations, we recog- 
nize motion, order, harmony ; but we find ourselves un- 
able to scan the entire field in which the creative Deity 
acts as the animating soul. 

Infinity cannot be measured. The mind grows dizzy 
when it attempts to fathom the unfathomable. Immens- 
ity is like the eternity of God ; it has no starting-point, 
no stopping-place, no bound, no given height or depth. 
It is the final climax of all ideas of greatness; the 
utmost of all notions of extension ; the totality of 
all thought ; the aggregate of all conceptions ; an all- 
mightiness as incomprehensible as Deity. And this in- 
finite vortex is the theatre through which and in which 



OUll FATHER. 48 

the divine soul permeates in irresistible power. You can 
find no sun, you can discover no earth, you can scan no 
star throughout the limitless expanse, that does not feel 
and acknowledge the sweet influence of the life-impart- 
ing Intelligence. It is a truth that fills all minds w T ith 
wonder, that He operates alike benevolently upon vast 
systems and upon the ultimates of matter ; that 4 His 
power is acknowledged as much by the monad as by the 
most resplendent sun. He is indeed the Father of all 
creations ; for He not only redeems them from chaos and 
confusion, but watches, with ceaseless and unwearying 
care, over their everlasting and upward transformations. 

It is in motion and in life that the Almighty utters 
His wisdom, and demonstrates His presence. Wherever 
you see matter, wherever your vision beholds organiza- 
tion, either vegetable or animal, there you may recog- 
nize a manifestation of Deity ; an incarnation of that stu- 
pendous power that has stretched out the firmament in 
beauty, and enthroned worlds in atmospheres palpitating 
w T ith life. The same universal breath that breathes sub- 
limely throughout the infinite whole, exhibits His exhaust- 
less benevolence in the most insignificant formation that 
meets the eye. 

The Eternal Deity is not limited to place ; He does not 
build Himself a habitation at a great distance from man, 
far off, in the great ocean of infinitude. Our Father 
does not withdraw Himself from us ; the light of His 
transcendent face is reflected as benignantly and brightly 
upon our earth as upon others. His sublime soul yearns 
towards us with the same ineffable and inexhaustible 
affection that it feels for other created intelligences. The 



44 OUR FATHER, , 

pulsations of His immortal spirit reach us through the 
great arteries of His love, as surely, as constantly, and as 
unerringly, as they extend to the most mighty universe 
that He has formed. His glorious hand is outstretched 
towards us in an everlasting chain of cause and effect. 

It is a truth as fixed and unalterable as God Himself, 
that He never has and never will forget to care for us. 
When Deity ceases to provide for and to sustain the life 
which He has given, then will He have ceased to act 
upon matter, and to utter Himself in forms. Then will 
suns cease to shine, and worlds to revolve around them. 
Then will the chains that bind the planets be broken, and 
order and harmony give place to darkness and confusion. 
Then will the glory of infinitude be blotted out, and its 
radiant atmospheres no longer reflect the smile of the 
universal Father. 

Inexpressibly sublime is that Power that upholds all. 
We bow our faces and our souls melt w T ithin us when we 
attempt to contemplate Him ; we tread with reverential 
awe in the sacred courts of the Supreme Creator; 
and the more intimately we study His works, and the 
more philosophically we watch the progress of the un- 
folding creations, the more truly our spirits wonder and 
adore. Infinitude is the habitation of God ; He dwells 
in no particular house built by human hands, any more 
than in another ; He inhabits one earth as much 
as He inhabits another ; He lives as much for one intel- 
ligence as for another ; and His existence is the same 
eternal necessity to all nations, kindreds and tongues. 
He is subject to no human passions ; His serenity is as 
deep as immensity, wide as infinity. His calm soul 



OUR FATHER. 45 

moves on in unruffled tranquillity ; His loving heart beats 
with everlasting kindness. He manifests now, and has 
ever since the morning stars were set in the frame 
of the universe, the measureless love of His benign 
spirit, by continual and unfaltering elevations. He for- 
ever seems to expand His almighty hands to bring all 
things below Him up towards Himself; to fold them to His 
own eternal bosom. Upward ever, through ascending 
scales, is the great law of Omnipotence. There is no 
exception to this principle ; and there are resurrections 
going on in all earths, in all particles, to the most ulti- 
mate of atoms. 

How grand are the operations of infinite power ! How 
exalted the scheme of universal redemption ! How lofty 
the salvation that reaches through immensity, and works 
but to refine and bless ! How joyful the gospel of all 
creations, preached by the workings of the Divinity, in 
every formation and every progressive development ! 
0, wondrous Father ! Thy thoughts are not like ours. 
Thou writest Thy glorious scriptures everywhere, and 
utterest the word of Thy truth in all things. Assist our 
feeble perceptions, that we may aspire to know Thee as 
Thou wouldst be known, and to love Thee even as Thou 
lovest us ! Flow into our interiors, and teach our minds 
to follow Thee more definitely in cause and effect, and to 
feel Thee more palpably as a source of sacred inspira- 
tion ! Creative Deity ! let Thy serene spirit whisper 
the words of Thy wisdom more tangibly to ours ! Har- 
monize these conflicting elements that cause us to wander 
in doubt and uncertainty. Give us that moral and intel- 
lectual elevation of mind that shall be like an eternal 



46 OUR FATHBB. 

Sabbath to the soul. Teach us to lift up our hands to 
Thee ever, and rejoice with joy unspeakable that Thy 
transformations are raising us continually into closer rela- 
tions with Thyself; to feel more palpably the throbbings 
of Thy deathless heart. * * * 

When did God begin to exist? When did His mighty 
heart begin to throb? Ask when motion first com- 
menced among the particles of matter ; when the affinities 
produced the first aggregation of atoms. He who can 
answer these questions can tell you when the breath of 
the Almighty first went forth in power. 

The existence of God is a subject which no finite mind 
can comprehend ; it is an idea so vast, that the mundane 
intellect cannot grasp it. The Deity must ever be a 
subject of wonder to created intelligences. The thing 
that is made cannot well understand the forces that made 
it; the spirit that is developed by the Cause of all causes, 
cannot trace the steps and phases of its life to the grand 
Original. There are many things in nature even, that 
cannot be comprehended by man ; the thoughts cannot 
grapple with the idea of space, and the brain grows dizzy 
that attempts to struggle with infinitude. How can that 
be measured which is immeasurable? how can that be 
calculated which is incalculable in itself? 

The mind shrinks and trembles when it contemplates a 
vortex that is illimitable. If the intellect is confounded 
when it strives to form some appropriate conception of the 
immensity of space, is it not natural that it should also be 
astounded when it attempts to arrive at the cause of all 
effects in the universe, or to compute the sum total of the 
years of eternity? The human thought falls down power- 



0U& FATHER. 47 

less before the conception of infinite existence and infinite 
power. 

"Who made God? " is a question asked by lisping 
infancy and hoary-headed age. Natural, but unprofit- 
able inquiry ! It is not in the power of language to ren- 
der this subject perfectly lucid, and the mind is equally 
incapable of understanding it. No human existence 
need reject the idea of a God, because he cannot compre- 
hend a being without beginning or end, any more than 
he should disbelieve that space is boundless, because he 
cannot grasp such an idea. Is God intelligent ? Is He 
a self-conscious being, employing in His creations the fac- 
ulties of reason and of calculation ? 

We answer, if you behold design and wisdom in His 
works, you can draw your own inferences. Where there 
is design there must be a designer. If you perceive in 
all the manifestations of Deity beauty, harmony and 
order, you must be inevitably led to the conclusion that 
they cannot be the result of any fortuitous circum- 
stances, or the production of what men call chance. It 
is a glorious and exalting truth, that there is a great gov- 
erning Mind, — a positive Will, that has never, and will 
never, act otherwise than benevolently in the work of cre- 
ating and guiding His creations. This Divine Intelligence 
is omnipotent in pow T er and omnipresent byflis agencies. 
From Him flow continuously, forces which operate His 
w T ill in every department of nature. His mandates and 
His potencies emanate or flow out of His essence simulta- 
neously. 

Those irresistible forces which are found throughout 
the universe, and which act in all places, are the nniinat- 



48 OUR FATHER. 

ing breathings of Deity ; or, in other words, the potent 
agents of nature belong to the divine resources, are a 
part of the Almighty, and the links which connect Him 
with all things animate and inanimate. It is this divine 
coalition that seeks utterance in forms and organiza- 
tions. The attractions and repulsions are the loving 
arms which He stretches out to grasp matter, and to 
reconcile all things to Himself, — the agents by which He 
redeems everything from its first grossness. 

The Deity is not a being who wills without the power 
to accomplish. There goes forth with the still, small 
voice of the Eternal, a force which can philosophically 
and unerringly work out its commands. From Him 
radiate those subtile agencies which are to produce 
effects, to be the causes of other effects ; while the last 
shall be causes for still other results, and so on through 
the endless scheme of refinements. 

In silence God utters His mandates, and in silence go 
out those activities which shall operate their full and 
complete accomplishment. How impressive the thought ! 
The most wonderful power in the universe works silently ! 
Innumerable worlds perform their stupendous cycles 
without perceptible sound, and the most beautiful forms 
are evolved and developed without noise and confusion. 
And this great Being is the Father cf the human race ! 
God truly made man ; but He made him as He made 
all other creations, by progressive steps. The laws of 
His operations are immutable ; and being benevolent in 
His purposes, the human intelligence may safely repose 
upon His arm. with peaceful, perfect, and everlasting trust, 
and ho may wisely pray, in the words of Jesus, " Our 



OUR FATHER. 49 

Father, let Thy will be done on earth, even as it is done 
in heaven. 5 ' He may add more than this, and say, " Lov- 
ing Benefactor, ever stretch forth Thine arms to refine, to 
redeem and to reconcile all, and the most ultimate of 
things to Thyself; and thus bring them nearer and 
nearer, eternally, to Thy sublime spirit." 
5 



FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 

You meet for certain purposes, — a friendly interchange 
of thought, a relation of experiences, &c. But we will 
suppose that the acquisition of truth is the principal 
object which each has in view. Taking it for granted 
that you are earnestly availing yourselves of every means 
of knowledge within your power, we will venture to offer 
such hints and suggestions as may seem best adapted to 
your exalted aim. 

It is well known to you that there are those who do 
not seek new truths ; or, to express the idea more intel- 
ligibly, do not desire to become acquainted with those 
which already exist in nature, and w^hich, in one sense of 
the word, are coeval with humanity, and can never, in 
that sense, be said to be new. The class referred to, 
believing that they have found all the truth that is 
requisite, embodied in creeds, trouble themselves no 
longer in relation to those important facts which contin- 
ually, as rational beings, solicit their attention. 

We will presume to affirm that the work of acquiring 
truth cannot be commenced and finished in any given 
time. It is a pursuit which will go on through the eter- 
nal pilgrimage which is before you. It is a labor which 
may commence with the first expansion of the faculties, 
but will not cease while the Divine mind continues to 



FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 51 

act, and the created existence perceives any enjoyment in 
studying new wonders, which must follow as a result of 
every successive development. But few persons, compar- 
atively, are in a condition to receive truth, in its broad- 
est sense, and in reference to theological questions. The 
condition here signified may be called a receptive 
condition. 

In looking over the world, and examining minds as they 
respectively present themselves, influenced as they are 
by conflicting religious dogmas, the fact that has been 
asserted is very apparent. Truth is simple ; but the 
multiplicity of religions, so called, has made it appear 
complex. This is not the fault of the Creator, but of the 
created ; it is not the error of Divinity, but of priest- 
hood. It is an axiom which may be boldly uttered, in 
all places, that those who are really the most expanded — 
whose knowledge is truly the most universal — whose 
philosophy extends most definitely to causes and their 
effects, are those who advance their opinions with the 
greatest cautiousness, and are the least dogmatical in 
their assumptions. 

The wise men of all ages have been the most modest 
in their pretensions, simple and unostentatious in their 
habits ; while the most ignorant have been the most 
assuming, fanatical and cruel. Bigotry is the compan- 
ion of narrow minds ; and humanity, in its truest type, 
as presented in the most exalted of men, shrinks from it 
with deadly fear. That is no truth to any individual 
that does not have the fullest assent of his reason. True 
manhood rejects, in toio, that which conflicts with the 
highest consciousness of right which the God of nature 



I 



52 FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 

has given ; it never does, it never can, receive a proposi- 
tion as true, on mere human authority, unless its correct- 
ness can be made apparent by a process of reasoning. 
The merits of all things which appeal to the internal or 
external senses of man must be judged and determined 
by the faculty of- reason ; it is the only standard which 
he has to test, to measure, to weigh everything relating 
to his present and future condition. 

Reason is the golden key which unlocks the gateway 
of truth, and displays to man the precious arcana of God 
and nature. Blind or passive faith is not a prerequi- 
site to the attainment of truth. Blind faith has been the 
curse of mankind ; it enslaves all the faculties ; it binds 
them with an adamantine chain ; it is the great angel* of 
the bottomless pit, who holds in his hand the key that 
locks up the way of human progress. Had passive faith 
been friendly to mundane development, truth would now 
walk up and down the courts of earth with a face 
brighter than the sun, and a step firmer than the pedes- 
tal of a Colossus. Blind faith has made millions of mis- 
erable and half-naked wretches immolate themselves to 
their detestable deities ; it has crushed the warm life out 
of innumerable bodies ; it has grasped human hearts in its 
murderous hand, and torn and lacerated them with untold 
agony; it has placed its sacrilegious foot full upon 
the affections, and trodden and trampled them into the 
very dust ; it has burned mountains of palpitating flesh ; 
it has so prostrated the divine human intellect, so sunk it 
down into the filth of superstition, so buried it in the 
grave of ignorance 3 that it has required, and still requires, 



FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 53 

the strong power of Divinity to resuscitate, elevate, and 
give a resurrection to the imbruted mind. 

0, blind faith ! idiotic credulity ! drivelling passivity ! 
Humanity, when she rises in her might to receive the 
crown which inspired Reason shall place upon her head, 
will bring you to a most awful account ; she will write with 
her enlightened finger upon your every part, 1 1 This is the 
enemy of God, of nature, and of mundane development." 

In the researches of men for truth, no unjustifiable de- 
mands are to be made upon their credulity. It is falsehood 
only that raises her voice, and requires a blind and un- 
manly obedience. Efforts for truth, and the effects of truth, 
are not degrading ; they will not deprive manhood of its 
heaven-derived rights ; they will not shame it, by hurling 
it to the ground to lick the feet of a designing priesthood. 
He who seeks truth, as we are now denominating it, in 
the broadest sense (meaning all truth that has relation 
to human existences), will seek it with calm earnestness, 
with rational forethought, with elevated desires, with dig- 
nified zeal. He will be an humble pupil of nature, — not 
humble in an unmanly sense, but in his estimate of him- 
self. The truth-seeker will never arrogantly exclaim, 
" You must believe as I do, or God will condemn you to 
ceaseless pain ; " but he would prefer saying, with mod- 
est diffidence, " My friend and brother, follow the dic- 
tates of your highest reason ; and do not believe this or 
that doctrine, because I advance them, as matters of 
opinion." 

One important truth, which we are anxious the world 
should realize, is,- that the requirements of true religion 
are not hard. True religion is easily learned by the 
5* 



54 FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 

wise, and finds its natural utterance in all the charities 
and courtesies of life. In searching for the gem of 
truth, you should not be selfish ; you will not seek so 
much for those minor truths which can be only of per- 
sonal application, as for those of a more -general nature, 
which will benefit the neighbor and the race of mankind. 
Endeavor to forget self, and to feel those generous and 
noble impulses which will enable you to occupy a loftier 
plane of thought, and to say, in deep earnestness of 
spirit, " Assist us, ruling Deity, to elevate and instruct 
our brethren, and endow us with that pure and unselfish 
philosophy that governed all the actions of the Nazarene ! " 
Be bold when bigotry assails, — firm when priesthood 
threatens, — calm when persecution rages, — forgiving when 
malice injures, — patient under suffering, — tranquil when 
scorn mocks at your doctrines, and reasonable in all 
things. Let nothing disturb the serenity of your souls ; 
trusting ever in the benevolence of the sustaining Father, 
pursue your earthly pilgrimage, animated with an 
unwavering hope that good will ultimately triumph over 
evil. Permit not your thoughts to centre within your- 
selves ; but let them flow out to others in all directions, 
and those around you will soon feel and acknowledge your 
influence. Be like an earth, or a moon, that reflect 
all those rays of light that are thrown upon them. As 
your organizations become harmonized, and wisdom flows 
in, nothing will so enlarge your capacities and exalt your 
manhood as a continual desire to bless and make others 
happy. There are always opportunities of lightening the 
sorrows of the sorrowful ; not a day passes without 
bringing them, and a kind word, look, smile, or a friendly 



FAMILIAR AVORDS TO A CIRCLE. 55 

pressure of the hand, will often tell the story of your own 
outgushing affections. 

We presume not to dictate to or to govern individual- 
ities more than is consistent with the laws of moral rec- 
titude. Wise counsellors will destroy no individualisms, 
take away no responsibilities; they will act rationally, 
and, so far as they can, for the advancement of the race. 
Minds have influenced each other in all ages of the world, 
and it is right that they should, when they exert that 
influence in a proper direction. " Ye shall know the 
tree by its fruits;" and, guided by the Supreme Being, 
angelic existences will endeavor to make the tree of 
humanity bud and blossom, and " bring forth the peace- 
able fruits of righteousness." They have no desire to 
make war upon any sacred institutions that are beneficial, 
or to deprive manhood of its glorious attributes. They 
perceive the earth divided and subdivided by sectarian 
w T alls, which must be thrown down. 

The period is approaching when the Jericho of priest- 
hood shall be encompassed by the armies of truth ; and 
when the trumpet gives a " certain sound," it shall 
tumble to the earth, and every man shall march up over 
the fallen w^alls " straight before him," to gaze with won- 
der upon the prostrate monuments of human folly. 

Seek to attain harmonious conditions, bodily and men- 
tally. Remember that these are the conditions of true 
inspiration to all. Inspiration will speak to the earth 
most effectually and wisely through well-balanced minds 
and healthy bodies. When these conditions prevail, the 
.soul is like an instrument in tune, and it only needs to be 
tuuched by the hand of a performer to give forth sweet 



56 FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 

sounds. The harp-strings of your minds, the chords of 
your affections, will be swept by unseen performers when 
conditions are auspicious. 

The mind is the most natural channel of spiritual 
utterance, and all are more or less susceptible of impres- 
sions. When the above prerequisites obtain, the sublini- 
est truths may be enunciated with a power that cannot 
well be attained when the control is merely physical. 
There are many persons so constituted that they will 
consider that the greatest blessing which expands the 
intellect ; such would desire no greater miracle than to 
become sensible of a sudden and marvellous enlargement 
of the mental faculties. The movement of sublime thoughts, 
to them, would be more convincing and agreeable than the 
mechanical movement of hands. The reception of a practi- 
cal truth, clothed in fitting language, would elate them 
more than the most physical and tangible manifestation. 
But individuals differ so much, that there .are others who 
prefer the sensuous to the intellectual; who are more 
thoroughly convinced of the presence of spiritual exist- 
ences by rappings and movings of ponderable bodies, 
than by the most beautiful inspiration that could fall 
upon the expectant soul. 

It is wise, then, to permit each class of mind to have 
its own kind of evidence, until, by patient action upon the 
organs, they can be controlled more perfectly, and en- 
dowed with loftier aspirations. 

Benevolent beings, out of the material body, will 
always adapt their manifestations judiciously to different 
organisms. Were all intellects well balanced, less pru- 
dence and cautiousness would be required on the part of 



FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 57 

the communicating intelligence ; for many are so prone 
to fanaticism, and to one-ideaism, that, unless great care 
and foresight be exercised, results may occur quite con- 
trary to those desired. For instance, there are intellects 
so weak that, were they once governed by tangible im- 
pressions, every conception, however absurd, might after- 
wards be mistaken for spiritual admonition ; a state of 
things which would by no means advance the cause of 
truth. 

Again ; the self-esteem, or self-ism, of one class, may 
pervert influences (which, to a healthy mentality would 
be wise and genial), so that they will flatter his pride, 
and lead him to suppose himself a favored instrument to 
work out some mighty effect, or to solve some important 
problem. 

Revelations are adapted, more or less, in their nature, 
to the organisms through which they flow ; by which is 
meant that there are some phases of truth which invisible 
beings would not undertake to impart through brains of a 
certain cast. Excited minds are not the ones to receive 
inspiration, but those most calm and tranquil. Spiritual 
receptions cannot well take place in cases of insane per- 
sons; for the reason that the organs are already so 
violently acted upon that they cannot be brought under 
any other control; or, at least, without extraordinary 
effort. If the insane could be thus directed, there would 
be a prospect of their speedy amendment. 

"When the spirit is most placid and rests most serenely 
among the convolutions of the brain, then is the most 
favorable moment of approaching it. This fact should be 
remembered, end admonish to the practice of temperance 



58 FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 

and to shun exciting causes. Whatever does not ex- 
ercise an elevating influence upon the thoughts and life, 
will of course be avoided. You are by no means to 
receive as genuine those compositions professing to ema- 
nate from illustrious personages in the spiritual world, 
which would be unworthy of them while inhabitants of 
this. Here, again, you will bring reason to your aid, 
that it may assist you in your judgments. 

There is one qualification, however, which it will be 
well to make ; invisible minds may not always be able to 
control the organisms through which they would gain 
utterance, and may thus be made to say what they never 
intended. Rest assured that wise spirits are good judges 
of literary productions ; and they will be extremely cau- 
tious about advising the publication of articles which would 
do discredit to their names as denizens of any place, 
mundane or celestial. Because a production has affixed 
to it the signature of a distinguished person, it must not 
be supposed, without characteristic evidence, that it rep- 
resents that individual. Reason will teach you that 
there are minds in the second sphere in all stages of de- 
velopment, the same as in the first ; consequently, there 
are those that may not control so judiciously as could be 
desired, and who have not that intimate knowledge of 
cause and effect observable in others who have attained to 
a loftier plane of wisdom. Much allowance must be 
made for imperfections in the instruments used ; some 
may be but partially developed, others intentionally dis- 
honest, and so, under the most favorable circumstances, 
truthful and easy utterance cannot be obtained. Some 
are so much excited by the consciousness that they arc 



FAMILIAK WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 59 

really controlled, that further advancement is checked ; 
and, growing anxious, finally cease to be perceptibly acted 
upon. Those are sought who will yield themselves cheer- 
fully and placidly to the influence of celestial thoughts. 
Many w r ill doubtless be found who will not exhaust pa- 
tience and disappoint expectation ; but the w T ork of gov- 
erning minds is not a labor unattended with difficulties, 
or one that does not require untiring zeal in its accom- 
plishment. You. w T ill perceive that to concentrate the 
efforts, for a long period of time, upon the instrument 
that has been selected, not only demands inexhaustible 
perseverance, but much love, and & patience to possess 
one's soul. During the process, many doubts have to be 
met and conquered ; many questions to be answered a 
thousand times over (internally), and the general tenor 
of the thoughts properly directed. But those who do a 
work of wisdom by striving to enlighten other intelli- 
gences have their reward in beholding the gradual 
unfoldings of the mundane subject. 

There is a great deal of worthless rubbish that has to be 
removed, which, if suffered to remain, would effectually 
choke the stream of inspiration, and render its w T aters 
impure. 

We have spoken of blind faith ; we will now say some- 
thing in reference to enlightened faith,— faith which has 
eyes. — faith which sees, — faith which can walk without 
being led. The popular faith of the present age cannot 
do this. To personify and speak of it as a being, it is a 
child of imperfect organization, whose nether limbs are so 
small that there is no hope that he will use them for 
purposes of locomotion ; and his powers of mastication so 



60 FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE, 

feeble, that he has to be continually fed upon pulpy foods, 
to keep hirn in existence. This feeble being has always 
to be attended by a nurse, and supported when he at- 
tempts to walk ; although he is such an imbecile creature, 
that he seldom undertakes any active exercise, but is con- 
tent to remain at rest, depending upon others for the 
nutriments that sustain his life. 

Enlightened Faith is like a strong and healthy man, 
who goes forth with form erect, with cheerful face, with 
firm and assured step. He cannot be imposed upon, or 
cajoled; prefers rather to feed himself than to be fed by 
others, and to consult his own taste in regard to what 
foods shall be taken. He does not feel the need of em- 
ploying others to do what he can do himself; he does 
not see the necessity of being blindfolded and led, when 
he has good visual organs, and when his powers of loco- 
motion are in no ways impaired, but are capable of per- 
forming all the offices which Nature designed. 

True and enlightened faith searches into the nature of 
things, and is always both competent and ready to give 
some good and sufficient reason for its hopes and expecta- 
tion ; it is disposed to take nothing at second-hand, and 
finds no gospel in that which is not endorsed by Reason. 

This principle of which we are speaking is not quid 
to condemn without investigation — is slow to believe 
without evidence. It is a divine element which is needed 
in the churches — a part of the interior life of the disci- 
ple of truth. When religious organizations consent to 
receive a vital faith, a better day will have dawned upon 
the earth. Faith not sustained by evidence is over- 
grown credulity, — makes the mind that receives it 



FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 61 

little better than a machine, tacitly acknowledges that 
it is unable to do its own thinking and form its own 
opinions, and^ is willing to be the dupe of any fool, knave, 
or fanatic, that chooses to lead it. 

It matters but little how many are led, providing they 
are led in- the right direction ; but here lies the difficulty 
the rock of Sisyphus, which must be rolled up the moun- 
tain. There are so many motives or incentives that stim- 
ulate and encourage minds to dishonest practices, that it 
is exceedingly difficult for those who stand at the head 
of religious monopolies to resist the many temptations 
which are offered, and to which their position exposes 
them, to turn the follies of their dupes to their own 
advantage. 

Priestly despots (and it is not difficult to find such) are 
like the rest of mankind ; they are as liberally endowed 
with the lower propensities; selfishness, cupidity and 
sensuality, assist to make up the sum of their existence, 
the same as with other men ; and, if the circumstances 
of the place which they occupy are calculated to act 
upon those propensities, the result must inevitably be 
similar as when their followers and fellows are exposed 
to like causes; consequently, blind faith is, at times, 
most lamentably imposed upon. 

"We do not wish to convey the idea that all religion? 
teachers would mislead, or take advantage of credu- 
lous people, for the good reason that this is not invaria- 
bly true ; but it may be confidently asserted that the God 
of Nature never designed a religious despotism. Great 
monopolies, whether civil or religious, have universally 
been attended with abuses. The history of all ages 
6 



62 FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 

demonstrates this affirmation. In the sight of God, all 
men are equal, and the same duties (in kind) devolve 
upon each. Religion does not demand senseless rites and 
ceremonies which can benefit no one ; nor does she teach 
that a few should be chosen to serve God for the many, 
to be supported without toil, clad in soft raftnent, and 
" fare sumptuously every day." 

Such individuals, call them by what name you please, 
are, in fact, the drones of society ; they produce nothing 
to add to the general good of the race. Nature hates 
idlers as much as she is said to abhor a vacuum. The 
Creative Deity, having the same objects in view in re- 
gard to every intelligence, cannot well be pleased at that 
order of things which gives one a life of luxury and ease 
at the expense and to the degradation of another. This 
is a proposition so plain, and bearing upon it so palpably 
the seal of truth, that we wonder that the masses have 
not more fully realized the fact, arisen in their moral 
might, to cast down and trample in the dust the unjust 
pretensions of leaders not enfranchised from absurdities 
which had their origin in the most gloomy ages. 

How puerile the idea that song-singing, Latin prayers, 
the swinging of censers filled with burning spices, the 
bendings, twistings, and contortions of a human body 
before an altar, the wearing of black coats, surplices, 
white handkerchiefs, or shaven crowns, can, in any way 
or manner, or for any possible reason, please the Infinite 
God ! Yet, drivelling credulity declares, solemnly, that 
this is worship — these the forms of true religion ! But 
behold the time coraeth when Deity shall not be wor- 



FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 63 

shipped in these mountains of superstition, but in spirit 
and in truth. 

We sliould love universally; pity both the debaser 
and the debased ; not only strive to better the condition 
of the latter, but to remove the errors of the former ; not 
only labor to elevate one, but for the exaltation of both. 
True philosophy does not simply sympathize "with the 
miserable, but goes to work, philanthropically, to devise 
means to instruct those who have made them so. Favor- 
itism is no part of the Divine economy ; it belongs to 
the human, theological economy. It is no evidence that 
we dislike a person because we reprove him for his 
faults ; the rebukes of a friend are better than the flat- 
teries of an enemy v No one will be injured by judicious 
reproofs, and they may be productive of incalculable 
good. Deception, knavery and error, may shrink from 
the lashings of truth ; but homely honesty, never. 

Who, then, among you will be angry, because wrong 
is scourged wherever found 1 

Those not too highly charged with prevailing dogmas 
' will be acted upon, more or less powerfully, by super- 
mundane forces ; prejudices will be softened, bitter ani- 
mosities smoothed down, and thoughts more in harmony 
with the principles of universal fraternity suggested. 
Many are influenced imperceptibly, who would scorn to 
acknowledge, in the pulpit and elsewhere, the possibility 
of any such control. But there are no favored ones in 
the eyes of Heaven, and the benevolent agencies which 
the Deity employs to dispense His providences perceive 
no difference in the great family of man, and have no 
more regard to the preposterous claims of self-righteous- 



64 FAMILIAR WOK0S TO A CIRCLE. 

ness, than they have to other conditions which are not 
wise, or incompatible with the general good. 

Keceive truth; but not truth second-hand, without 
some rational evidence. Tou are not to believe a propo- 
sition merely because it is found in a certain book or 
books, but because it appeals to your highest convictions 
of right. If dogmatically enjoined to give credence to 
this or that theory because it is found in an ancient record 
and therefore must be God's truth, reply, that all truth, 
w T herever found, is God's truth ; for there is nothing true 
or good that does not flow from Him. We would not en- 
courage a spirit of i/zfidelity, but a spirit of the most ex- 
alted fidelity ) — fidelity to yourselves, as rational beings, 
— fidelity to the neighbor, and, above all, fidelity to your 
Creator. Strive to be sincerely charitable in your feel- 
ings towards those of other modes of thinking. Where 
you see individuals really seeking sound philosophy, 
kindly endeavor to assist them in the work. You will 
not set yourselves up as mentors, for you are too w T ell 
acquainted with human nature, and understand too well 
the liabilities of all men to fall into error, to do so. 
You will prudently assist honesty to arrive at something 
useful and honorable, in that unaffected w T ay which real 
philanthropy inspires. To those who scoff at your ideas 
of human elevation, you will show, by your placid dig- 
nity, that you are unmoved in your purposes, and 
unruffled in your temper. With hypocrisy you will be 
wise as serpents, and harmless as doves. 

Show the soundness of your principles by your lives. 
Be not troubled in regard to the future ; for where one 
acts in accordance with his deepest convictions of duty, 



FAMILIAR WORDS TO A CIRCLE. 65 

and works while the day lasts, there can be no cause for 
disquietude. Be not impatient, but, relying cheerfully 
upon celestial aid, pursue the way of your worldly 
struggle with serene and hopeful souls. 

6* 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

It is a doctrine which has long been embodied in pop- 
ular theology, that the earth will be destroyed by fire ; 
that the sun and moon will be blotted out ; that the num- 
berless planets, which, philosophy teaches us, are worlds, 
inhabited by rational existences, will cease to be the thea- 
tres of life and beauty, be torn from their orbits, and 
mingle with the great conflagration of the flaming 
heavens. 

These stupendous events are not to be the result of 
mere accident, but of a predetermination on the part of 
Deity, who has, from the foundation of the world, resolved 
to punish the disobedient in this singular and awful man- 
ner. Over this almighty wreck of worlds and luminaries, 
the Eternal Father will reign in pitiless triumph, and in 
all the placid and sublime exaltation of one who ministers 
to justice, and metes out punishment to the hopelessly 
sinful and lost. 

Upward through this universal ruin the "saints" will 
be seen flying, seeking the bosom of Abraham, escorted by 
innumerable angels. All these momentous affairs are to 
take place at a certain time. A trumpet will be blown 
with such astounding vehemence, that all the living shall 
hear; and then a most wonderful commotion will begin. 
The dead bodies of human beings who have perished in 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 67 

different ages of the world, will by some strange power, 
be gathered from the elements into which they have re- 
solved, be redeemed from other countless forms and organ- 
izations, be built up and resuscitated by the animating 
breath of Deity, and revisited by the immortal spirit, 
which has been performing a long pilgrimage in unknown 
regions, or sleeping a deep and dreamless slumber. 

We are told that, while the blast of the last trumpet is 
echoing through the universe, various fragments of dis- 
severed and separated bodies will be flying like hailstones 
through the air, to be conjoined, bone to its kindred bone, 
flesh to its kindred flesh ! 

Wonderful scene, indeed ! Extraordinary confusion 
in the order of Nature ! One might pause and ask, 
while contemplating in imagination such a remarkable 
spectacle, if the benevolent God had not ceased to exist ; 
or, if some mad fiend had not usurped the prerogative of 
Almighty Power ! 

Verily the requirements of blind faith are hard and 
exacting. The mind can perceive no beauty in the de- 
struction of systems of worlds, enthroned in grandeur, by 
the hand of Infinite Love. It sees no wisdom in taking 
backward steps ; in sweeping away those creations which 
were the work of untold ages. Reason speaks to the 
soul's deepest and best intuitions, and says, in a voice that 
shall prove louder than the blast of that great trumpet so 
often talked of and so little understood, that there are 
no retrogressions in the order of divine government. 
The agencies by which, and through which, act the 
Divine Energy, are spread abroad through the universe, 
exhibiting symmetry and order, may be seen in planets, 



G8 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

suns and earths, which will never cease to roll and shine 
while they subserve the mighty purposes of the Creative 
Will. Human bodies, when once cast aside, will not 
again become the residences of the immortal spirits that 
once dwelt within them. The voice of Nature speaks to 
those discarded tenements, and her laws grasp them with 
a strong hand ; their atoms yield to the universal -tend- 
ency of all things ; they rapidly disappear as organisms, 
like metals thrown into glowing crucibles, to be melted, 
and to appear again in other forms. 

How strong is the power of Deity when He utters His 
will in law ! and we see it illustrated when He seizes the 
mortal frame, and subjects it to the transforming influ- 
ences of the chemicals found in His vast laboratory. 

The foot-prints of the Deity are traced in eternal mu- 
tations, — mutations which change but to elevate, and 
elevate but to bless. The hignan body is made up of 
gross elements, which are found in the vegetable and ani- 
mal kingdoms, in the shape of those animals, roots and 
plants, which are employed as foods. The grain of wheat, 
after mastication and deglutition, becomes a portion of the 
organism ; like all other things, it has yielded to the law 
of necessity, and changed its form. The animal, after 
being slain, undergoes a similar process, with a like 
result ; both the vegetable and the animal have become a 
part and parcel of the body. 

Transformations of this nature go on unceasingly 
during the life of man ; and his externals are taken from 
and belong to the external world ; they are refined from 
the vegetable and animal kingdoms below him ; and, hav- 
ing fulfilled their uses in the divine economy, in building 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 69 

up a temple for the immortal spirit, when the latter 
changes its' mode of existence, the former will be no 
longer needed ; and, according to all the rules of fitness 
and adaptability, would only serve to clog his progress, 
were he to inhabit it forever, and cut off the possibility of 
that higher and more expanded existence which is the 
heritage of the undying soul. 

Those bodies that were made the subjects of death in 
the primal ages have, ere this period, passed through 
thousands and thousands of changes ; they have animated 
the vegetable, they have given life to the animal. Men 
may be said to have eaten their fatherland grandfathers ; 
and the transmigration of bodies is a literal fact. 

By what marvellous process shall the dust of the 
human race be redeemed from these innumerable changes ? 
How shall each individual atom be recognized and made 
to take its place in the original structure ? By what 
singular law will the attractions be made to act precisely 
as at first upon matter that has been decomposed for ages 
into gases and earths, and answered so many varied 
uses, passed through so many forms and bodies, and 
whose constituents are now separated by millions and 
millions of miles ? It is well known to the students of 
nature, that the body is often renewed during life ; and 
the human spirit, it may justly be affirmed, occupies sev- 
eral bodies during its existence in the rudimental world. 
Here we would ask of the prevailing theology, which of 
these bodies will be raised 1 Will it be the first, the sec- 
ond, the third, or the last ? Will it be the form of help- 
less infancy, of strong manhood, or of decrepit old age ? 
Will all be resuscitated? If so, w T hich will be the temple 



70 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

fittest for the spirit to inhabit, or will it inhabit them all 
at one and the same time, or consecutively? 

Theology does not answer ; it pauses and stammers ; 
it is confounded by philosophy, — a philosophy so well 
established that it is familiar to every child. The idea 
of a physical resurrection is repugnant to God's word, 
as spoken everywhere in nature. The resurrection of 
immortal spirits is the only resurrection of which the 
race will be the subjects. The benevolent Father, having 
developed an eternal principle, does, and will, when the 
proper time arrives, raise it to another sphere, to exist 
independently of gross organization. What sublimer 
resurrection could possibly be devised by Infinite Wis- 
dom, than that which redeems all that is glorious in man- 
hood from constant contact with that which is imperfect 
and corruptible ? 

When the process of the physical resurrection referred 
to has been completed, — when the sun, moon and stars, 
have been swept away, and the skies and earth given to 
the devouring flame, — the whole family of man, in the 
bodies which they once inhabited, good and bad, will 
stand before God, to be judged and rewarded, individu- 
ally, according to their respective merits. The earth 
being burned, upon what they will stand, or where "they 
will stand, popular theology does not reveal ; nor does it 
inform us whether the laws of gravitation will be sus- 
pended, and corporeal bodies be able to walk upon air. 

All mundane intelligences, having been conducted to 
the august presence of One who has been called the 
" Dread Sovereign of the universe, 77 will be separated 
one from another ; the " saints 77 being placed upon the 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 71 

right hand, and the " sinners " upon the left. By the 
saints, it is important that it should be understood that 
those are designated who have made public profession of 
religion, joined the churches, submitted to certain rites 
and ordinances; such, for instance, as being sprinkled 
with "water, drinking the blood and eating the body of 
Christ in the consecrated wafer and wine, together with 
various self-abasements and mortifications of the flesh, 
&c, according to the peculiar views of this or that reli- 
gious organization; while the " sinners," to be brief and 
comprehensive, include all those unhappy individuals who 
have performed none of these things, or performed them 
imperfectly. Blessed saints ! miserable sinners ! stand- 
ing upon nothing, they await the final decision of the en- 
throned Judg^j w T ho, lest His memory should prove 
treacherous, has opened a book, wherein has been kept 
an account of all mortal doings ! 

We would profane no truth ; we would shock no mind 
too rudely ; but would overthrow falsehood, wherever 
found, or however sacredly enshrined in human creeds 
and affections. Time can never make true what is false 
in itself; rolling ages cannot invest error with a sanctity 
that it is sacrilegious to tear away. Falsehood can never 
be cherished so long, or preached upon so eloquently, as 
to make it necessary to the happiness of man, or to 
engraft it as a thing of importance upon the beautiful tree 
of divine and established truth, whose roots are found 
deeply fixed in nature, and whose life-blood flows from 
Deity Himself. We will tread as lightly and as lovingly 
upon this consecrated ground as is consistent with the 
exorcism of error, and compatible with the great rule of 



72 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

right, which declares in all places; and at all times, that 
essential truth is better than darkened falsehood. 

We proceed with the subject. Behold a great multi- 
tude, which no man can number, standing before the seat 
of the inexorable God. Although other gross matter has 
been destroyed in the holocaust of worlds, this vast 
assemblage of corporeal bodies remain beneath the star- 
less skies, an exception to the general rule, which has 
annihilated other forms. How changed is the aspect 
of the universe! The eyes of both " saint" and " sin- 
ner " wander in vain amid the wide arches of space, to 
catch a momentary glimpse of some distant planet, some 
friendly moon, or some refulgent sun. Alas ! those 
noble creations have ceased to be ; systems will revolve 
around systems no more; earths, and mgons, and suns, 
and stars, will wheel their way through the trackless 
atmospheres, shine and reflect no more. 

Where, where, are those innumerable existences 
that dwelt upon those extinguished worlds ? Where are 
those cunningly-organized forms, and those deathless souls, 
that were smiling with hope and happy with expectation, 
a moment ago ? Have they perished with the stupen- 
dous ruin ? Have the chemicals of the Almighty resolved 
those unnumbered spirits into their first principles, or 
have they also, reunited to their first bodies,, come to the 
" general judgment," to hear the words of final doom 7 

Mighty aggregation of created intelligences ! Space 
itself might almost groan for room ! How long will it 
take to judge all these beings? How long before the 
leaves of the volume in which their acts are recorded will 
be turned over and read aloud in the hearing of the count- 






THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 73 

less congregation? Thousands and thousands of years 
•will roll away, ere the work of the " general judgment " 
is completed ; and all human existences, clothed in real 
bodies of flesh and blood, w 7 ill remain poised somewhere 
in space longer than the world itself is said to have ex- 
isted, even allowing but a few seconds for recounting the 
deeds of each individual, and sending him to his " own 
place." 

The throne of the stern Judge is supposed to be sur- 
rounded by an army of angels so vast that they cannot be 
computed, waiting patiently to conduct the " saints" to 
heaven, and to drive with flaming swords the accursed 
u sinners " down to the awful regions of measureless woe. 
Where these angels came from, or what is their origin, is 
another mystery which popular theology does not make 
known. If they were once human beings, we would ask 
why they are exceptions to the physical resurrection ? 
Where are the bodies of all these radiant intelligences, 
furnishing enough, in corporeal substance, to create a 
world of themselves ? Have they gross organisms 1 If 
they have, w r here did they obtain them, and how long have 
they had them ? If they have not gross organisms, can 
they exist just as happily without them ? and, if the 
affirmative be true, why could not this great array of 
persons have existed in the same manner % Where are 
Moses and Elias ) Have they again been fleshed, after 
dwelling for thousands of years in the society of other 
blest immortals, and in the sunlight of God's heavens ? 
Where are Abraham, Isaac and Jacob ? Have the pa- 
triarchs been in states of progression, or have they slept 
in unconsciousness since they laid aside the physical form '? 



74 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

Long slumber ! Dire interruption of immortality ! Did 
Moses and Elias start up out of their dream, to be trans- 
figured a moment in brightness, and then sink back into 
that horrible sleep which only the reverberations of the last 
trumpet can awakon ? — Alas ! we exclaim, did they sink 
back to cold annihilation, after contemplating, for a brief 
instant, the glory of God, the calm and luminous face of 
Jesus, and feeling within them the pulsations of a more 
exalted life ? With a groan which nature herself might 
hear with pity, we may imagine they relapsed once more 
into the arms of misty night and dread oblivion. 

Once more we would put the question : Did those 
angelic intelligences ever exist, upon any earth, in corpo- 
real form ? If they never did, whence did they derive 
their origin ? 

We would now turn the attention in another direc- 
tion. Just opposite the supernal person of u Jehovah," 
and the shining armies of heaven, is seen another 
display of immortal existences, — the Devil and his 
angels. This great prince of the powers of darkness 
is seated upon a throne less dazzling, and his person 
scintillates with an effulgence less glorious, than that of 
the inexorable Judge. He is darkly majestic, and fear- 
fully imposing in his appearance. A proud, scornful, 
malignant and sublimely defiant smile still plays upon 
his lips, and lends a dark enchantment to his accursed 
visage. A triple crown encircles his God-daring brows, 
which glows and sparkles with the infernal fires of the 
bottomless pit. 

To contemplate this mighty being, he does not seem to 
have lost all resemblance to the Eternal Power against 
which he is darkly leagued. There are some flashes 



y 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 7o 

of light playing about his tremendous form ; and he is 
sublime even in defeat. Around him we behold one of 
the most wonderful assemblages upon which horror ever 
gloated her eyes, and before which superstition ever fell 
down dismayed. We perceive deathless intelligences, 
with faces blackened with passions that cannot be re- 
strained, and distorted with pains that cannot be reckoned 
in the category of all human ideas ; their eyes gleam 
with the invidious cunning of the serpent, and, like the 
serpent, they forever hiss forth the innate venom of their 
souls. Their delight is in evil; their sole joy in the 
most accursed of things, — in the misery of others,— in 
the cries of despair which irremediable ruin wrings from 
the doomed soul. Total depravity would seem to have- 
grasped them in its mighty arms, to make them wholly, 
totally and forever its own. 

Who created this dark Satan? — who endowed his 
wicked heart with eternal life ? — who gifted his malig- 
nant mind with those vast powers that make him second 
only to Deity in omniscience and omnipresence ? Is 
he an almighty fungus, that sprang up during some dark 
night of the universe, wkhout the pale, government and 
guidance, of fixed and immutable laws ? Is he a creation 
of chance, an agglomeration of immortal essences, over 
which the far-reaching affinities of the Creating Mind 
had no control ? If so, would He not, upon discovering 
this strange freak of chance, have torn away the horrible 
excrescence with His almighty hand, or at least remod- 
elled it, so that it would have subserved some good end 
in the workings of the universal whole ? If popular 
theology will not allow us to take this view of the case, 



\ 



76 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

we would respectfully ask for some wiser and more phi- 
losophical expose of the subject. What unfriendly in- 
fluence created that terrible being, who sustains upon his 
shoulders one end of the great fabric of the theology of 
to-day ? "What is his use in the economy of God ? We 
can perceive why he is useful to the churches, but we 
cannot see his use in that great plan of redemption 
which Deity has established for the elevation of all 
things. 

If it be affirmed that God created Satan, it must be 
admitted that He created a monster to mar and destroy 
human existences, — beings who are said to be His chil- 
dren, and objects of His love and tenderness. How 
singular that theology has not been more definite about 
the genealogy and origin of a personal devil — a crea- 
tion as necessary to the existence of superstition as can 
well be imagined ! He may be called a mighty pack- 
horse, upon which human folly lays its sins, in order to 
escape self-condemnation, and the consequences which 
must result from wrong-doing : but he is a pack-horse 
that has now become old and weary, and staggers 
beneath the crushing burdens humanity compels him to 
bear. As powerful as he is represented to be, Satan 
must indeed be supposed, occasionally, to groan in spirit, 
and exclaim, in tones of dreadful anguish, "My burden 
is greater than I can bear. Omnipotent God, grant me 
annihilation, and I will be content therewith!* 7 Alas, 
poor Satan ! you must toil on under your load, until 
wisdom commences her reign upon the earth ; when you 
will vanish away like the mists of morning, and be seen 
and heard no more forever. 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 77 

From the prince of evil turn we a moment to his dark 
associates — his angels. Did they once exist upon the 
earth, like the better class of angels ? Have they es- 
caped the physical resurrection ? Like them, are they 
an exception to the universal law that declares corporeal 
bodies must be raised to immortality ? Most strange law 
that acts so imperfectly ! Here are the Devil and his 
angels without physical organisms, waiting to be doomed 
to eternal pain, and no one ca*n assign any reason why 
they are not ( fleshed like the " saints and sinners." 
Consistent theology! Harmonious plan of redemption! 
Transcendent system of salvation ! What marvellous 
aspects dost thou present when viewed upon all sides, 
and weighed in the balance that ever finds the untruth- 
ful wanting, and condemns it in every part ! 0, Eeason, 
we glorify the Father that thou art a visitant to mun- 
dane intelligences ! n Thou art a jewel of great price, 
which men have endeavored to hide in the field of human 
creeds ;. but Thy light is not wholly obscured, and shall 
yet shine upon and develop the flowers of the under- 
standing. 

But the judgment waits ; the u saints" look resigned, 
the " sinners" feel already the throes of a hopeless de- 
spair. We will, in imagination, pass over numberless 
ages, and declare that the books have been read, and the 
Judge, after His continued labors, is ready to pronounce 
the words of irrevocable doom. To the " saints" He 
says, u Come, faithful few, and inhabit the mansions of 
blessedness which my love and wisdom have prepared to 
be your eternal habitations. The angels will give unto 
you white robes, and you shall sit at my feet forever 
7* 



78 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

and play upon golden harps. 7 ' The Great Arbiter of 
human destiny pauses, and His face grows dark with 
wrath, as He contemplates the despairing wretches upon 
His left. He stretches forth the hand that made them, 
and exclaims, with awful majesty, " Depart, accursed 
children, to suffer the torments of eternal agony in the 
lake of fire prepared for the Devil and his angels, where 
hope will never visit you with its delights, or happiness 
enthrone itself in your hearts; where endless lamentations 
will be heard, and wailing and gnashing of teeth shall 
bespeak a measure of woe which cannot be uttered ! JJ 

Instantly, thereupon, while the voice of the Eternal 
still reverberates in space, myriads of human existences 
have plunged into an abyss too horrible for the mind to 
dwell upon with calmness. Involved in that stupendous 
ruin are the Devil and his angels — corporeal bodies and 
incorporeal spirits — spirits in the flesh, and spirits out 
of the flesh, forming one grand mixture of depravity and 
pain. High over this aggregation of human misery sit 
the " saints J? in smiling placidity of soul, gazing upon this 
ineffable destruction, striking their golden harps in loud 
notes of praise, singing " Thy will be done, God ! " 

Deity is represented as being well pleased with this 
kind of adulation, and as feeling within His divine heart 
no regret that the many are irrevocably miserable, while 
the few only are happy. And this is declared to be the 
final result of all the labors of Deity, — this the grand 
climax of His scheme of redemption ! Not a throb of 
disappointment beats in His bosom ; not a w r ave of pity 
awakens a shade of softness in His countenance ; His 
nature is harder than adamant ; His soul sterner than 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 79 

Nero ; He is content with the song-singing of the 
"saints," and unmoved by the lamentations of the hope- 
lessly damned. He has ceased from the work of crea- 
tion; no more grand evolutions of Divine Power will 
take place ; no more worlds and systems will be set up 
in the heavens ; the arms of Divinity will no longer 
reach through infinitude to preside over formations ; His 
future employment will be to punish the "sinners," and 
to listen to the minstrelsy of the " saints." 

Sublime God ! how have men profaned Thy name, 
character and attributes ! Breathe lovingly upon created 
existences, until they shall know Thee more perfectly, 
and adore Thee with all their mind, might and strength • 
till Thy name shall be sweeter to them than all other 
names, and Thy love find free and beautiful utterance in 
their lives ! 

When will the "general judgment" take place? 
When will God "judge the world"? When will He 
reward the "righteous" and punish the "wicked" ? In 
the words of Jesus, we answer and say, " Now is the 
judgment OF this world." God is daily and hourly 
judging men, and rewarding them according to their 
deserts. He has been engaged in this work since the 
first man stood forth in His image ; and He will con- 
tinue it while human intelligences shall exist. There is 
no violation of law which He does not punish, be it 
organic or moral. Divine justice does not slumber for a 
great number of years, but performs its offices imme- 
diately, when the offence is given. This is a system of 
judgment which no one can evade ; it is as far-reaching 
as Deity, and as impartial as He in His dispensations : 



80 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

it visits all nations, all societies, all organizations, all 
minds, with wisdom and certainty ; inflicting its stripes 
according to the capacity and knowledge of the sinner. 

Erom this plaQ of Divine judgment no offender can 
hide himself; and the mountains of human creeds and 
the rocks of hypocrisy cannot cover them so deeply but 
it can search them out and scourge them. The humble, 
the poor, the lowly, are respected as much, in the oper- 
ations of this judgment, as the titled, the wealthy, 
the powerful, the self-sanctified. It brings all exist- 
ences to a level ; it establishes an eternal system of 
equality, and there is no possibility that the innocent 
will suffer for the guilty, as in the administration of 
mundane laws. God has indeed a "book," and it is 
forever open ; its pages are composed of undeviating 
laws, stretching out in all directions, grasping all minds, 
and governing beautifully and harmoniously all terres- 
trial affairs. It is a book so sacred that there can never 
be written upon it a lie ; the spirit of love and truth 
breathes through all its w r ords and sentences. In this 
volume of divine laws God judges the world ; it is the 
only perfect and infallible book that He has written, and 
is more enduring than the tablets of stone upon which 
the ten commandments were graven. Ordinary books 
may be marred by human ignorance or caprice ; and 
some careless Moses may break the tables of stone ; but 
this glorious work which Deity has transcribed can 
never be mutilated by accident, earthly folly, or malice. 

Men have indeed reason to rejoice that the judg- 
ment moves steadily forward without respect to persons. 
There can be no mistake in its awards ; for it is founded 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 81 

in the very nature of things, and lives in both the phys- 
ical and mental organisms. Proclaim it, then, in every 
place, that no mind can do a wrong, either physical or 
moral, without suffering the punishment of the judgment 
which cannot err in its enactments. The notion of a 
" general judgment," as it is called by popular theology, 
is a mighty instrument of terror which priesthood em- 
ploys to lash human souls into a blind endorsement of 
creeds which they cannot, and never will understand. 
It is a fearful alarum, to excite needless anxieties, un- 
profitable forebodings, and a certain looking for of fiery 
indignation, which the economy of God has never des- 
tined to transpire. 

In the pulpit, the "general judgment" is a thunder- 
bolt to hurl at the heads of the "'impenitent and unbe- 
lieving;" it is a scathing lightning to dart at the hearts 
of the "unconcerned;" an earthquake to shake the 
ground beneath their feet, and make the earth yawn like 
the mouth of the fabled abyss of hell. Men and women 
are admonished to take thought for the morrow, and, by 
consenting to be reconciled to God, escape the terrors of 
that great day of universal doom, and fit themselves to 
take their places among the blessed " saints." It is thus 
that the wrath of God is made to leacf human beings to 
repentance, so called, which simply means, in this sense, 
subscribing to creeds. 

Those who profess to be converted under the influences 
of these modern Sinais do not act from pftre and ex- 
alted principles. In the words of the poet : 

" The fear of hell's a hangman's whip 
To haud the wretch in order." 



82 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

Su6h repentance as this is neither useful to man nor 
acceptable to God ; it brings forth no fruits of goodness 
to attest to the practicality and reality of the change. 
As has been often repeated, the principle of love is the 
only element capable of reforming the human character, 
and cause it to bring forth the fair flowers and delicious 
fruits of charity and true manhood. 

" God hath appointed a day in which He will judge the 
world," and that day is now and ever. All existences 
are now standing before the judgment-seat of the Al- 
mighty, and they will never cease to stand in His august 
presence. No immortal being will ever be able to escape 
for a moment from the Far- Seeing Eye. In life and in 
death, in this world or in the other, they will stand 
revealed precisely as they are, in the sight of Deity; 
consequently, they will be judged accordingly, and there 
can be no exception to a rule so just, founded as it is in 
the eternal law of right. Let each pursue his earthly 
way, feeling that God will do all things well, and oper- 
ate, in all cases, for the universal good. His judgments 
will be tempered with mercy ; for they are disciplinary, 
and intended to reform the life and instruct the mind. 
Even punishment is to save, — so wise, so kind, so 
gentle and paternal, are the dealings of our Heavenly 
Father. 

To sum up all, the system of Divine judgment is not 
a thing to shrink from with terror, because its object is 
not vindictive, but benevolent ; and is another display of 
a wisdom and beneficence that is exhaustless in resource, 
and tireless in works of goodness. How emphatically 
and earnestly we may cry out, u Thy ways arc not as 



THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 83 

our ways, thy thoughts are not as our thoughts, > 
Divine Father ; and all things in Thy creative economy 
•work together to bless and elevate created existences." 

It may be asked where is the mighty angel spoken of 
in the Apocalypse, who was to stand with one foot upon 
the sea, and the other upon the land, to declare in a loud 
voice that " time shall be longer 5 '? 

We answer, there is such an angel now spanning sea 
and land. The electric telegraph declares that time 
shall be no more, — but a mere abstract idea, — and that 
space itself is conquered. The Genius of electricity is 
indeed "clothed in a cloud;" the " rainbow is upon his 
head;" his "face is like the sun," carrying heat and 
light to all dark and cold places ; and "his feet are as 
pillars of fire," scorning, in his might and swiftness, time 
and distance. When the electric angel becomes a motive 
power, "the seven thunders will utter their voices" to 
all the kindreds, tongues and nations of the globe : 
yoked, by the ingenuity of man, to the car of Wisdom, 
he shall preach the universal gospel of peace and frater- 
nity to those who have hitherto sat in the darkness of 
superstition. That "old serpent" — Ignorance, — some- 
times called Satan, — which has hitherto "deceived the 
nations, Gog and Magog," shall be cast into the lake 
which burnetii with the fires of free thought ; and there, 
while the smoke of his torment ascendeth, be utterly 
consumed. Yes, the glorious car of Wisdom shall roll 
triumphant over the earth, blowing, with a sweetly sol- 
emn sound, the silver trumpet of love, proclaiming that 
the former inharmonious things have passed away ; that 
the new heavens and the new earth are bein^ created : 

O 7 



84 THE RESURRECTION AND THE JUDGMENT. 

that Our Father dwells with men, and will wipe all tears 
of sorrow and distrust from the eyes of all people. Then 
shall the true worshippers need no temple ; for Nature 
shall be their temple, and the bright reflection of the 
Almighty Soul shall be their perpetual light. 



EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 

It is an idea that has long prevailed in religious 
circles, that the Divine mind has never yet been fully 
satisfied with man — the flower of His creations ; and, in 
fact, that for many ages He has been angry with the 
human race. 

It would appear, were creeds to be received as truth, 
that the Divine Being, at the period w T hen He commenced 
the developments that were to end in the production of a 
rational intelligence, was not possessed of that far-reach- 
ing and unerring foresight which would enable Him to 
determine the results of His labors. The human ex- 
istence having disappointed him, and proved to be quite 
a different creature from what He intended, became hate- 
ful to His sight, and no longer the object of His peculiar 
fatherly love and protection. Such, at least, was the 
notion that obtained in early periods of human history. 
and which has been handed down from generation to 
generation, to the present time. 

This conception originated in minds whose perceptions 
of a Deity were more faint and imperfect than the dark- 
est twilight that ever preceded a sunrise. Every con- 
vulsion of nature was regarded as an indication of the 
wrath of the Creator. Were the clouds dark with storm 
and tempest, — did the thunder reverberate through the 



86 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 



skies, — did the lightnings flash. — did the earthquake 
rend the mountains, — did the volcano vomit forth its 
lava and flame, — the Presiding Divinity was angry, and 
some extraordinary propitiatory offering was necessary to 
restore the placidity of the ruling powers. It occurred 
to those darkened intellects, that when they were angry 
with each other, they were actuated by revengeful feel- 
ings, and often shed blood without remorse. Blood 
appeased them, wdien nothing else would suffice. 

Supposing that the Divine Intelligence was like unto 
themselves, they imagined that, w T hen He was displeased 
with their conduct, blood would also turn aside His 
wrath, and restore them again to His favor. 

And this has been an error in all ages of the world, 
that men have thought the Deity influenced by the same 
gross passions that govern their own actions. Human 
sacrifices were offered, and the steam of human blood 
went up from many altars; and the Devil — had there 
been such a being — might well have rejoiced at behold- 
iug the horrible sacrifices which brutalized ignorance 
offered to the benevolent Father. 

Time rolled on, working its changes in debased minds, 
until another step was taken — another advance made; 
animals were substituted in place of human beings for 
expiatory offerings. This was an important phase in the 
order of progression. Even the people called the He- 
brews, who claim, and have claimed in all periods of time, 
to be the favored people of God. evidently once had their 
sacrifices of human beings ; and the idea that such offer- 
ings were necessary was so strongly fixed in their minds, 
that Moses found it impossible to remove it. The priests 



EXPIATORY O^FEBIKGS. 87 

who succeeded him as leaders of the people were not 
averse to having the ''firstlings of the flock,'* those 
u without spot or blemish/*' the very fattest, brought to 
them as atonements for sin. 

Those religious guides proved to be great economists ; 
for they not only made lambs, heifers, calves, &c, blot 
out the sins of their brethren, but they made them serve 
also as food ; thinking, no doubt, that roasted meats were 
no bad offerings to an empty stomach. Priesthood de- 
lighted in such sacrifices as these; and they devoted 
themselves with great alacrity and zeal to the delightful 
task of slaughtering and eating the best of the flock ; 
taking care to have it distinctly understood that God's 
anger would in no wise be abated if they brought old, 
and tough, and poor animals. 

Whether these ministers of the altar did not like to 
masticate tough meats, is a question which we will not 
pause to consider. No individual was excepted from 
paying tithes among the Hebrews. The poorest of the 
poor, the most miserable of the miserable, the most de- 
graded of the degraded, were to produce their expiatory 
offerings ; and those were to be the very best of their 
scanty possessions. The poor widow must bring her lamb 
or her calf, and, if she had but two, the one in the best con- 
dition, or her sins could in no wise be forgiven ; — and, 
perhaps, it w r ould not be uncharitable to say that the 
priests who were to fatten upon the sin-offerings would 
have been the most unforgiving of all. 

The notion that God loves blood still prevails.- v There 
are thousands of human beings, calling themselves Chris- 
tians, who suppose, or affect to suppose, that blood, and 



88 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 

blood only, can reconcile God to a guilty world, or recon- 
cile a guilty world to God. ~ 

If there is any conception of the mind that does foul 
dishonor to the name and character of the Eternal Father, 
it is this ; if there is one error that is more pernicious in 
its results than another, it is this ; if there is one doctrine 
under heaven more degrading than another, this is that 
doctrine. It makes the Creator like the created ; it 
brings Him to a level with the bad passions of men ; it 
fills Him with petty malice, and the heart-burnings of 
revenge ; it makes Him an enemy to the human race, 
ruling over His existences with a rod of iron ; a watch- 
ful tyrant, instead of a disinterested friend : a pitiless 
judge, instead of a forgiving Father. 

It is established as an eternal law, w T hich never was 
and never will be changed, that there must always exist a 
relation between cause and effect. Blood cannot cleanse 
from sin ; it cannot make the impure, pure ; the unchari- 
table, charitable ; the unloving, loving ; the ignorant, 
wise ; the bigoted, liberal in opinion ; the selfish, un- 
selfish ; it can do no work of enlightenment, perform no 
mission of good, work out no salvation from evil, under 
the sun. No, no ! it is not blood that the serene Mind 
of Deity desires. Were He the sanguinary Being which 
He is represented, He would stretch forth His own right 
hand, turn the ocean into blood, and the rivers and seas 
into smoking gore. 

Hark ! through the skies of the universe, there 
breathes a still, Small voice ; it is sweeter than the soft 
sounds of summer ; more melodious than notes of celes- 
tial music ; more comforting to the human spirit than all 



EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 89 

the hollow words of priesthood; more exalting to the 
soul of humanity than all the sermons of mortal men : 

" Son, give me thine heart: Creature of my bounty, 
wander no longer in the dark places of superstition, but 
look abroad upon my heavens, — contemplate my crea- 
tions,— understand my plan of operations ; — know that 
I am thy Father, and that the smiles of my countenance 
are uplifted upon all intelligences. Make offerings of 
love and charity to thy fellow-man, and mine own eternal 
nature will desire no other sacrifice. I have no pleasure 
in blood ; I delight not in burnt-offerings." 

"The blood of Christ," you exclaim, "cleanseth from 
all sin." 

We answer, Christ was not an expiatory offering. To 
prove that he was, you must first prove that God was 
angry. 

il Most easy task." you reply. " The Bible most em- 
phatically declares, in an hundred places, that Jehovah 
was often fearfully convulsed with wrath." 

We answer, the book you call the Bible is the work 
of human hands. It cannot be shown, and we challenge 
the universal world to show, that it is the first, last, 
and only ivord of God. Because an individual who 
lived in some obscure period of the past affirms that the 
Divine Being was subject to sudden and awful outbursts 
of passion, are we obliged to accept his assertion as true ? 
Shall we presume to endorse such a falsehood with our 
belief? Does the great bible of Nature declare that He 
is changeable, or that He was ever angry ] Has not the 
life-imparting sun shone for innumerable years upon the 
earth / Has it ever been plucked from its orbit by the 
8* 



90 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 

hand of Infinite Power ? Has the moon been dethroned ? 
Have the fixed stars been hurled from their places, to 
become eternal wanderers through space ? Have systems 
of worlds ceased to revolve around their great centres ? 
Has there ever been an all-mighty and all-ruinous crash 
of the universal fabric 1 Has not the earth brought forth 
food ? Have not the rains developed the grasses, and the 
dews unfolded the flowers ? Have not the sunny south 
winds breathed with fertilizing power upon the soil, and 
wafted sweet odors to your nostrils ? Has not the air of 
the Eternal inflated your lungs, and reddened your blood 
with the blushes of life ? Have not the seasons been 
regular in their alternations ? Have not seed-time and 
harvest visited you with undeviating certainty ? 

Where, then, is your evidence that God is, or has ever 
been, angry with human existences ? What cares the 
Mind, who sits enthroned in everlasting triumph above all 
matter; who works all changes among, the moving parti- 
cles ; whose mighty agents reach through all infinity ; 
whose potent attractions and repulsions elaborate and sus- 
tain all creations, — what cares He for all the blood that 
could be poured out upon the earth, or upon the sea ? If 
He were angry, would such oblations please Him? Would 
a few drops of blood, shed upon a heap of stones, called 
an altar, have power to affect His peace, or change His 
determinations ? Would the smoke of burning animals 
ascend with a grateful odor to His nostrils? Would 
human offerings do better ? Would half the inhabitants 
of the globe, if slain, mollify the wrath of " Jehovah "? 
Does there exist any relation between cause and effect, in 
this case ? If such relation does exist, can it not be 



EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 91 

philosophically explained^ so that if blood be really neces- 
sary to reconcile a Father to His children, we may know 
just how much is required, — when, and under what cir- 
cumstances, it is to be shed ? If we wrong the neighbor, 
will blood atone for that wrong ? If we take away his 
property unjustly, will blood restore it ? Is it a fixed 
fact, in the economy of God, that one person can atone for 
the sins of another ? If so, how long has this state of 
things existed, what is its philosophy, and by what un- 
accountable means is the cause equal to the effect ? 

We would now put the question in its broadest and 
most significant sense : Can blood, human or animal, shed 
at any time, at any place, under any conditions, please 
God, or atone for mortal errors ? 

Again we hear you respond, most fervently, 

" Thank Heaven, yes ! The Divine Father accepted 
the blood of His only Son, as a propitiation for our sins." 

Most singular Father ! most extraordinary system of 
justice ! The Supreme Intelligence, being offended with 
the crown of His creations, consents that His beloved Son, 
Jesus, should be incarnated and die for those who justly 
deserved to be swept, with the besom of destruction, from 
the face of the earth. And this is your idea of justice ; 
this is that most false dogma of vicarious atonement ! It 
is taking a retrograde step, and living, so far as the prin- 
ciple is concerned, in the spirit of those ages when human 
sacrifices were thought the most pleasing offerings to the 
ruling deities. 

You recoil in amazement ; you are convulsed with holy 
borror ; you exclaim, " This is Deism, most foul ! " No, 
this is not Deism — this is truth : — a truth destined to be 



92 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 

of universal prevalence. We have no evidence that Jesus 
ever declared, or wished it to be understood, that his 
death was to be a propitiatory offering. Had he come to 
the earth to die only in this manner, would he not have 
said distinctly : 

'• Listen, and bear witness, all ye inhabitants of the 
earth. I am the only son of the Eternal God ; I rep- 
resent Him among you ; He is very angry with the 
human race, and I have been incarnated for the sole pur- 
pose of dying upon the cross, and making one last, grand 
sacrificial offering for the sins of all nations." 

But the exalted Nazarene never gave utterance to such 
sentiments ; he was too wise and benevolent to give voice 
to such conceptions. He knew the nature of his mission - 
too well to allow himself to make impressions of this 
character. He w T as a being so harmoniously organized, 
and so nicely balanced, intellectually and physically, that 
Superior Wisdom found in him the channels of an easy 
utterance ; the Universal Intelligence breathed most di- 
vinely through him in the enunciation of fundamental 
truths. He came to create no truths ; but only to utter 
and demonstrate those which already existed in the 
Divine Mind and in Nature. His great and predomi- 
nating thought was, to develop the innate powers of the 
human soul ; for truth to the soul is like sunlight to the 
flowers, — it expands and unfolds. It must, we think, 
upon critical examination, be allowed by every one un- 
fettered by the shackles of superstition, that it was fully 
apparent to the mind of that personage that all the 
prevailing notions respecting sacrificial atonements were 
degrading to the creature, and unasked of the Creator. 



JiXPIATUKY OFFERINGS. , 93 

He would no more have affirmed, we imagine, that his 
blood could atone for wrongs committed, than he would 
have asserted that the blood of bulls, rams, and other 
animals, could have done so ; because He knew, to a moral 
certainty, that the principle involved was entirely at 
variance with the laws that govern human development. 

The important fact, so often overlooked by mundane 
intelligences, that the Creative Deity is ever and eternally 
happy, immutable, and never weary of operating benev- 
olent transformations, was perfectly comprehended, no 
doubt, by the reformer of Nazareth. The Divine Mind, 
so far as we are able to judge, did not create the different 
gradations of life with any other object than to endow 
them with happiness. A sheep, a lamb, or a human 
being, could never, by any possibility or any imaginable 
contingency, be any more His than they were ; they were 
His in life, they were His in death, and eternally His as 
much in one state as another ; and no offering upon 
mountain, upon hill, upon altar or in groves, could ap- 
propriate them more particularly to His use or pleasure, 
than they were then or are now appropriated. All crea- 
tions were elaborated because the benevolent Animating 
Soul delighted to be engaged in works of love, sublimity 
and beauty. Having uttered Himself in forms and 
organizations, He wisely willed that those forms and 
organizations should be surrounded and continually sup- 
plied by all those elements which their natures demand, 
to conduct them to maturity, and to minister to their 
future progress. 
* Human organizations had wants which could not well 
be supplied independently of each other ; but God never 



94 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 

had wants, being Himself a concentration and combina- 
tion of all excellences and all powers ; and there is not 
an element of good which does not commingle in the 
infinite sum of His perfections. 

Let this central truth be reiterated until the earth 
shall be full of its echoes : It has ever been and will ever 
be a ceaseless and eternal truth of the Divine Mind, 
that all true religion finds the voices of its wor- 
ship in acts of benevolence, in works of goodness per- 
formed, among those who need acts of charity, and want 
works of goodness. Keligion, then, is not a thing of 
heaven, but a thing of earth; Religion manifests itself 
among the poor and the miserable. Deity is not the 
legitimate object of man's religion. "Pure and unde- 
filed religion before God, the Father,' 7 is this : 

"To visit the widow and the fatherless;" and is not 
that solemn mockery which profanely attempts to flatter 
and please the Divine Intelligence hj imposing ceremo- 
nies, vain observances, empty words, long and hypocritical 
prayers, expiatory offerings of blood in any form, or any- 
thing else which is not truthful in itself, ennobling in its 
aspirations, pure and elevated in its purposes ? 

Jesus proved, beyond a doubt, that he occupied pre- 
cisely this position, both by his words and by his works. 
He assured his audiences, in the most unequivocal way, 
that when they placed garments upon naked and shiver- 
ing bodies ; when they put food into famishing mouths ; 
when they gave water to parched tongues; visited pris- 
oners, and ministered to the sick, they were offering the 
most acceptable sacrifices that humanity could offer to the 
Almighty God. 



EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 95 

We accept and endorse such sentiments as these, as 
worthy any mind or of any age : they do honor to the 
Divine Being, and sing louder anthems to His praise 
than all the songs that priesthood ever attempted to ele- 
vate above its lofty spires, to soothe the Creator into 
complacency , and make Him the God of a " peculiar 
people. 77 

Again you exclaim, " What is the good of a Saviour? 
You reject the atonement — you trample the blood of the 
covenant under your feet." 

We rejoin, Jesus of Nazareth is no Saviour to him who 
does not follow his example. That wonderful Teacher 
has left no records to tell us how sin can be atoned for in 
any other way than by reform. If living in open vio- 
lation of the laws that govern the human organism has 
produced disease, nothing can in any manner redeem that 
organism from suffering that does not have relation to the 
cause of the disturbance. 

Earthly minds need an atonement for wrong-doing ; 
and that atonement may best be found, as we have stated, 
in reform. Jesus never said to any degraded and sin- 
ful being (to our knowledge), not even to Mary Mag- 
dalene, who had seven devils, or to the woman convicted 
of impurity, " Fallen child of Adam's posterity, I am 
about to die and make a complete atonement for all your 
vices, follies and wrong-doing;" but he said, "Go in 
peace, SIN NO MORE." 

What better atonement can God require than an 
amendment of the life 1 What sweeter incense than the 
daily practice of benevolence? What better worship 
than the adorations of a spirit that worships Him in 



96 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 

truth ? What more acceptable prayer than the thanks- 
giving of a heart that knows Him, and acknowledges 
Him in His creations ? 

You reply, "The Jewish rites were but types and 
shadows." 

To answer this objection in one brief sentence, it is 
only necessary to say, that they were the follies of a 
people unenlightened, and the heavy burdens imposed by 
priesthood. Were human sacrifices also typical, — and 
if so, of what were they typical % Whether they were 
typical or not, they were at least significant — - most 
deeply significant ; significant of human degradation, — 
significant of cruelty, — significant of brutal passions, — 
significant of barbarous ignorance, — significant of dis- 
gusting superstition. As well might the Hebrews have 
said, after they had substituted animal offerings for 
human, that the latter w r ere highly typical, as for the 
believers in vicarious atonement to affirm that the whole- 
sale murder of helpless animals was typical of a better 
day — symbolical of the last and most acceptable expia- 
tory offering that was to be made upon the earth, in the 
crucifixion of Jesus. 

It does indeed appear very singular, w T hen the reason- 
ing faculties are brought into action, that a sacrifice of 
such general application as this, should be permitted by 
that Wisdom that adapts means to ends, to transpire in 
an obscure city, and under circumstances so ordinary, and 
so little calculated to become universally known to those 
who are to be saved from " eternal damnation" by that 
event. Ignorance and sin prevailed in every part of the 
world and among all nations : and if there was a single 



EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 97 

individual upon the earth in danger pf eternal conse- 
quences through the "fall of Adam," all were in equal 
jeopardy; and an impartial God would have made the 
conditions of salvation the same to all. Were heathen 
nations, or could heathen nations be benefited by an ex- 
piatory offering, of which they were in total ignorance ? 
If the negative of this be allowed, then the cause which 
was to produce a certain result was not adequate to that 
result ; for no considerable numbers of the inhabitants of 
the globe were conscious that such an individual as Jesus 
had ever lived or died, or that God had accepted his 
death as an atonement for their sins. 

If we look at the subject in an affirmative point of 
view, and say that the offering was equally efficacious, 
whether known or unknown, then we may be led to the 
inference that a sick man enjoys himself just as well as 
a person in perfect health. It would be like having great 
wealth left to one in a country so distant that the person 
upon whom it is entailed shall never have the remotest 
knowledge or conception of the fact ; and, though in one 
sense that individual may be said to have lived and died 
a rich man, yet who can be so foolish as to suppose that 
he was any happier for it ? 

You add, in reply, "that certain individuals visited 
various nations upon the globe, to tell them that a vica- 
rious atonement had been made." 

Alas ! what reasonable pagan would receive such a 
message as this ? By what possible means is he to know 
that such an atonement has been made ? 

"He is to know it, because he is told so," you 
answer. 

9 



98 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 

Are we to believe all that is told us, whether it is 
reasonable or not ? If a follower of Mahomet comes 
to us, and declares that prophet had twenty thousand 
revelations from heaven, must we believe it on his testi- 
mony alone ? Should we not ask him what proofs he 
could adduce in evidence of this ? And, if he replied, 
with a dogmatical air, "I know it to be true, and you 
are an infidel dog if you do not believe ;" you would in- 
stantly say in return, " I never saw Mahomet — I never 
heard of his twenty thousand visions — and therefore 
I reject the whole as absurd and ridiculous." 

P901* pagan ! he never saw Jesus ; he never heard of 
his incarnation and death ; and he thinks it very unnat- 
ural for the Father of the race to permit men to slay His 
son, and to accept his blood as an offset for those good 
deeds which they should have performed, but have not. 
Even the ignorant heathen thinks it strange that the 
Supreme God should have experienced any satisfaction 
in the crucifixion of His son ; it appears more reasonable 
to him that Mahomet should have had twenty thousand 
visions, than that the Great Soul of the Universe should 
have had any pleasure in the pains of such a good man 
as Jesus ; and he is at a loss to know what relation they 
could have had to the eating of an apple, the " fall of 
man," and his restoration to his original estate of para- 
disiacal purity. Enforce upon that same mind that Jesus 
was a teacher of truth, and a martyr to priesthood, and 
he may understand you. 

There are many'notions prevalent among sectarians in 
regard to the Divinity of Christ. Some profess to be- 
lieve in his sonhood, in the strictest sense of the term ; 



EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 99 

while others affect to believe in both his sonhood and 
fatherhood ; thus making Jesus his own father and his 
own son. It is often preached in the pulpit, that the 
Eternal Deity took upon Himself the nature of man, and 
actually lived upon the earth, and worked at the trade of 
a carpenter, for over thirty years ; and, to finish out His 
plans of salvation, dies upon the cross to appease His own 
wrath, remains dead three days, and then ascends to Him- 
self, sits down upon His own right hand, to intercede with 
Himself, and to excite His own sympathy by referring 
Himself to His own sufferings, in order to save His 
own creations from everlasting condemnation and suffer- 
ing by His own free act. 

The ignorant Hindoo cannot so well understand this as 
he can the mysteries of Vishnu and Buddha. "It is 
strange," he exclaims, "that such wonderful and im- 
portant events should excite so little attention among the 
people where they happened, and that they should trans- 
pire in a portion of the world so remote, and in a place 
so obscure." It is thus that the false and monstrous 
claims which you make on the credulity of the pagan 
mind defeat your own purposes ; for he is unable to see, 
as you present it, any beauty in the mission of Christ, 
and is not benefited by his spotless life and character. 
He perceives that even those who profess to believe in the 
mysteries of which we have been speaking are greatly 
divided among themselves ; and he asks, " If these things 
are so plain, why so many divisions and subdivisions 
among you, and those eternal bickerings, which keep you 
constantly engaged in a warfare of words'? Some of you 
Christians declare that infants cannot be saved unless 



100 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 

they are baptized ; thus making water a saviour, instead 
of Christ, "who, you affirm, made a complete atonement ; 
and, if so, what need of water ? While others assert that 
the mere act of believing in the mysteries which have 
been mentioned is sufficient to secure eternal salvation. 
How, then, shall those be saved who never heard of these 
matters ; and who comprise the greatest portion of the 
inhabitants of the globe ? Are they to be made eternal 
sufferers for not believing a transaction of which, or in a 
man of whom, they are utterly ignorant ? If this view 
of the subject be compatible with your ideas, it is not 
with mine ; for it does not seem to illustrate the opera- 
tions of Omnipotent Power and Divine Wisdom; inasmuch 
as it must be very evident, even to you, that the major- 
ity of human beings would perish without being at all 
benefited by the incarnation of God. Your holy book, 
which you call the Bible, declares, in one place, that He 
is no respecter of persons ; but, providing this system of 
redemption which you have been trying to explain be 
true, He palpably contradicts in His works what He 
says in His u wordP 

You will ask, " Since you do not believe that Christ 
was an expiatory offering, upon what shall the human 
race found their hopes of redemption?" 

We answer, there is a system of redemption unspeak- 
ably higher than any discoursed of in books ; it is as vast 
as immensity, coextensive with infinitude ; it is a system 
of redemption that permeates all creations, and grasps, 
with its mighty force, all matter. It commenced with 
the first attractions and repulsions among the monads, 



EXPIATORY OFFERINGS. 101 

has gone uninterruptedly on through unnumbered ages, 
and is coeval with God Himself. 

This stupendous system of redemption operates by 
unchanging laws, and with a certainty that knows no 
exceptions. It acts by continuous refinements and ele- 
vations. It manifests itself in symmetry, in beauty, and 
in power, in every department of Nature, and is that 
great principle of progression by which God will recon- 
cile all things to Himself; both the things of heaven 
and the things of earth. It fills the soul with joy, to 
know that the hand of Omnipotence works ever, and is 
never idle ; that human folly cannot frustrate His plan of 
redemption, or interrupt the upward tendencies of all 
things. 

Deity will not only reconcile this world to Himself, 
but all worlds ; He will reconcile all matter to forms, 
and all forms to organizations ; He not only speaks His 
word to one mind, but He speaks it to all, and it is only 
the superstitious and the bigoted that cannot hear. His 
word is as old as the heavens, and is written in a volume 
whose pages are as wide as space. God is impartial ; 
He has given His revelations to all races of men, and 
He has formed no plan of redemption which is not wide 
enough to embrace all that He has created. 

Expiatory offerings, then, are not needed in the econ- 
omy of God and Nature. Reform is the only offering 
which the great evangelium of truth requires. Reason 
endorses this verdict, and all the works of the serene 
Deity say, Amen. The sublime work of redemption will 
go. on, eternally, and all things will rejoice in the smile 
9* 



102 EXPIATORY OFFERINGS 

of the benevolent Father, who presides in all places, and 
governs in all worlds. 

How aptly the words of the Christian Scriptures come 
home to our souls, "God will reconcile all things to 
Himself;" for His system of reconciliation reaches to 
every heaven, and works benignantly in every earth ! 



THE BIBLE. 

As an objection to the interesting developments now 
attracting attention, it is urged by Protestant sectarians, 
that the Bible contains all the revelation which humanity 
needs, or which the Divine Being will ever make. r 

If this assumption be just, we would inquire why 
church leaders have been preaching so long and indefati- 
gably? Has it been for the purpose of revealing new 
truth ? If the affirmative be true, then they have been 
making additional revelations, stultify their own argu- 
ments, and expose themselves to the pain of their own 
awful penalties, which they attach to this heinous 
offence. If, on the contrary, the negative position be 
assumed, we would very well like to understand what 
they have been doing for many years. If they have 
revealed nothing new, no person has been instructed, and 
their time has been very unprofitably spent. Here ap- 
pears to be a dilemma into which these teachers and 
followers have unguardedly fallen. 

We are by no means disposed to reject the book called 
the Bible. We find in it much historical matter as truth- 
ful, unquestionably, in the main, as other ancient author- 
ities. The different writers of the various books are not 
to be very severely dealt with for being a little partial to 
their own nation ; for that kind of egotism characterizes 



104 THE BIBLE. 

many histories, and is not an unpardonable sin, by any 
means. 

The Jewish Scriptures, despite all their imperfections, 
furnish interesting data of the progress of the race. 
They were written by many authors, at different periods 
of time, after the Jews had attained to the idea of one 
God — a personality, passional and sentimental, pleased 
and displeased, calm and stormy, like themselves. Some 
portions of the book under consideration are highly 
poetical and grand ; others gloomy, rhapsodical, fanat- 
ical. Some parts are full of meaning, others apparently 
meaningless. The style is often nervous and sublime ; 
frequently incoherent, abrupt, eccentric, puerile and 
unsatisfactory, leaving the reader entirely in the dark in 
relation to what it signifies. We might perhaps bring 
against certain portions the charge of obscenity, but are 
not disposed to find fault with a history from which so 
much valuable knowledge may be derived, and which, on 
the whole, is a highly creditable production for the 
warlike and blood-crimsoned ages whence it origin- 
ated. 

The Jewish Scriptures show us the first conceptions 
of God entertained by a rude people ; they bring to the 
present, a mass of initiatory steps and rudimental ex- 
periences, of the past. The force of this position must 
be seen by every candid mind. The present flowed from, 
and out of, the past. The past may represent the in- 
cipient roots of the tree of humanity, and the present its 
trunk and branches. We derive nourishment from the 
parent root, as well as from the atmosphere and other 
sources. All the theological fluids flowing to us through 



THE BIBLE. 105 

the medium of the Bible, adapted to our wants and cal- 
culated to strengthen our spiritual manhood, should be 
rationally and joyously received. It is not advisable 
that any consistent truth be rejected on account of its 
antiquity ; such a course would argue a self-reliance and 
egotism not compatible with advancement. 

We are inclined to take a common-sense and unpreju- 
diced view of the subject. We can injure the authority 
of the Bible more by claiming what it does not claim for 
itself, than by according to it just what it deserves. Re- 
ligious sects place an idolatrous and unwarrantable esti- 
mate on the book; they bow down to it as the embodiment 
and intensification of all truth, purity and perfection — 
perfect, infallible and eternal in all its parts, the only 
guide the world has needed, or will ever need, from 
which nothing must be taken, and to which nothing must 
be added. 

The Mahometans set up the same exaggerated pre- 
tensions for the Alcoran ; so do other nations for their 
sacred books. Is it not a little singular that such a 
marked parallelism runs through nations in this respect 1 
Mahomet probably received the same warrant from the 
Almighty, to use the sword in the dissemination of his 
new doctrines, that the Jews received. When the lat- 
ter saw a fine country which they coveted, their priests 
easily got permission for them to go and slay the lawful 
possessors of the soil. " Manifest destiny" was more 
accommodating then than now. We have no doubt but a 
Jewish priesthood, transplanted from the past to the pres- 
ent, would readily procure a solemn injunction for the 
United States to make a conquest of the island of Cuba, 



106 THE BIBLE. 

as soon as invading armies could be equipped and sent 
there. 

Spiritual communications were quite as complaisant 
and yielding as those occurring to-day. Were the Model 
Republic to take the Jews and their sacred canons for 
guides, it might find Gentiles, Philistines, and Amal- 
ekites in all the surrounding nations, and keep its Paix- 
hans and revolvers in continual use — bid adieu to peace 
and fraternity forever, and scatter the teachings of the 
Reformer of Nazareth to the winds. 

In this assertion we are fortified by the concurrent 
testimony of all the past. No labored argumentation 
could possibly fortify us more impregnably in this posi- 
tion. The truth thus presented speaks in tones that 
cannot but make itself heard. Those who worship the 
primitive history are leaning upon a broken reed that 
will not support their weight ; and they will find in the 
instructions of Jesus no precedent for casting their 
manhood upon such a frail prop. 

No work, however ancient and time-honored, can justify 
or palliate war, especially when waged for the purpose 
of conquest and plunder, and attended with great cruelty 
and slaughter. The people of this republic have reason 
to congratulate themselves that they live in an age of 
comparative peace. The nation with whom the Bible 
originated, under the ostensible sanction of " Jehovah," 
were guilty of the most horrible cruelties. If such prac- 
tices were right in that age, have the principles of equity 
changed so much that they are not so in this 1 If an 
infallible revelation from the Most High gives us a pre- 



THE BIBLE. 107 

cedent, may we not invade any country on the strength 
of it, without much conscientious twinging 1 

We believe many of the things recorded in the Jewish 
testament,— believe them as rationally and fully as we 
can transactions which did not transpire under our own 
observation, making suitable allowances for the authors' 
religious or political prejudices. There is much to admire 
in the prophets, seers, and inspired men of the periods 
which the Bible covers in its records. We are struck 
with the energy and perseverance of Moses, as well as 
astonished at the fickleness and instability of the people 
whom he delivered from degrading servitude. We see 
something instructive and entertaining in the life of Abra- 
ham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Noah, Lot, Samuel, Saul, 
David, and many others. We are delighted with the 
perusal of that fine. allegory known as the book of Job. 
The faith of Elisha is refreshing, when contrasted with 
the cold scepticism of the professed prophets of modern 
times. We perceive in Isaiah a soul that had retired into 
the depths of the inner life, and, standing by the still 
waters of inspiration, his harp gave forth a pleasing 
sound. With pleasure we listen to its dying cadences, 
and turn again to catch the distant echoes. Jeremiah 
was a sympathetic medium, and his notes went out in 
sadness, because his people erred. Daniel should not 
be forgotten, for he has left us a practical lesson in die- 
tetics, worthy to be emulated. We learn from him that 
the food had something to do with the conditions of 
prophecy and clairvoyance. An empty stomach made a 
clear brain. 

We find so much in the Jewish Testament that is in- 



108 THE BIBLE. 

structive, that we are by no means ready to advise any 
person to repudiate it. We recommend to all a candid 
perusal of its numerous spiritual manifestations. Such an 
examination will enforce the pleasing fact that men were 
cognizant of angelic ministration as far back as we have 
any history. On this account, if no other, the book has 
a real value. Believe the Bible consistently, and just as 
you would any other work. Judge it according to its 
intrinsic merit, and reverence what portions you suppose 
to be true, precisely as you do truth found anywhere. 
We place the human soul above books, for the reason 
that all books have to flow through it. Without human 
mediation there would be no books. The maker is su- 
perior to that which is made. Men made the Bible. 
God, to our knowledge, has never written a book, — save 
the sublime book of Nature, — and, if He should ever ex- 
press himself in ink and upon paper, it will be more 
sublime than the Jewish testament. 

No book can be inspiratio?i itself, but only the result 
of inspiration. Inspiration, to be appreciated, must be 
felt. This is so palpable, that it is a wonder how the 
Bible could be so misapprehended, and made to take the 
place of that real inspiration which belongs to the soul, 
and which Our Father is always ready to accord, when 
the conditions of the organism permit. The world will be 
full of prophets when all men live in agreement with a 
few simple laws, which govern bodily and mental health. 
The requirements of the God of Nature are easy ; no 
long pilgrimages are demanded, no violation of good 
sense, no monstrous tax upon the credulity. 

Different men. at different times, wrote the Bible. 



THE BIBLE. 109 

Some of them were inspired, and some were not ; for 
no particular inspiration is necessary in order to record a 
battle, or the details of an every-day transaction. We 
might as well say that inspiration is needful to keep a 
ledger, or make a charge upon a day-book. There were 
many undeveloped prophets who were not reliable ; and 
indeed it was not easy to distinguish the true from the 
false, for there was quite an army of them. The import- 
ance, therefore, to be attached to the revelation, was to 
be measured by the prophet's development. If he was 
very susceptible and accordant, he could evolve valuable 
truths, sublime maxims, and trustworthy predictions — 
as a few of the better order of clairvoyants occasionally 
do now. Prophecies failed when the conditions of the 
seer were not good. 

The Jewish revelations usually related to some import- 
ant political crisis ; and out of the great numbers who 
often prophesied before kings, not more than one or two 
were found who were reliable. 

When that particular crisis had passed and another ar- 
rived, the same thing was enacted over again, until there 
was scarcely an event of any magnitude that was not 
made the subject of prophecy. " Jehovah" was con- 
sulted frequently on matters as trivial as those which are 
now laid before the spirits supposed to be in attendance 
upon circles. 

The various prophecies made, and communications re- 
ceived, together with the books attributed to Moses, and 
other histories, were in process of time collected as sacred 
writings, although there is no evidence to show that they 
were ever intended by their authors as infallible guides 
10 



110 THE BIBLE. 

to salvation in all future ages. The writings themselves 
make no such claims. 

The Bible cannot be called a complete and perfect re- 
flection of the Divine Mind, because the Divine Mind 
cannot be reflected perfectly and completely through so 
small a portion of His creations as one man, or many 
men. God can only reflect His thoughts and beauties, on 
a scale sufficiently grand, in the extended fields of the 
universe. The Old Testament fails to present Deity in 
the true sublimity of His character — falls immeasurably 
below the aggregate of his perfections. The soul of the 
Father is not mirrored between the leaves of that work, 
but we can find the crude images of earthly minds there. 
It makes God a being endowed with all the peculiarities 
of human nature. The Jews had reached the Monothe- 
istic age. One great Personality, whom they called " Je- 
hovah,'' was generally believed in by them, although he 
was thought to be a local Deity — the peculiar God and 
Benefactor of a peculiar people. 

An important advance was made on Polytheism, but 
ignorance and superstition hung their dark relics about 
the Creative Soul ; they clothed Him with terrible attri- 
butes ; they made Him like the Allah of Mahomet, omnip- 
otent and revengeful. The devastating storm, war, pesti- 
lence and famine, are represented as legitimate indications 
of Jehovah's anger. 

The Jews were slow to receive new ideas ; they had a 
great horror of innovation. Many forms of ancient wor- 
ship were retained even after they had grown into the idea 
of but one God ; altars and sacrifices were thought indis- 
pensable. It was extremely difficult for the authoritative 



THE BIBLE. Ill 

Moses to restrain all the previous predilections for idol- 
worship. The impression of many gods clung to them 
long after they had seen the cloudy summit of Mount 
Sinai. If there had not been a marked proclivity tow- 
ards Polytheism, the golden calf would never have been 
moulded, and the fair Hebrew dames and damsels would 
have retained their jewelry for legitimate uses. The 
light had dawned faintly upon the world, — the footprints 
of progression were found upon the hoary sides of Mount 
Sinai, and could be traced backward to other periods, 
when human beings had not arrived at a knowledge and 
consciousness of their own powers and responsibilities, — 
when naked and barbarous they wandered up and down, 
and had their habitations in the caves of the earth and 
the clefts of the rocks, — when the lowest manifestations 
of Nature were deified, — when darkness prevailed, — 
when humanity was without the form of knowledge and 
void of truth, — before the spirit of wisdom had moved 
palpably upon the face of the waters of life. 

Reason points to the grossness, cruelty and darkness, 
of other ages, and asks if you will go there for infallible 
guidance to the highest good. Is it to be found among 
the ruins and imperfections of past systems ? Is it not 
rather to be sought for in fresh streams of inspiration, 
flowing continually from the Great Fountain of perfec- 
tion? 

The green footprints of progression take their de- 
parture from Sinai, and tend towards the living Mount 
Sion. We follow them, and rest upon Mount Olives. 
We hear a voice softer and more persuasive than that of 
Moses — Jesus speaks. He stands in the footprints and 



112 THE BIBLE. 

declares that God is " Our Father." The right chord is 
touched at last, — the human soul gives forth its music, — 
the " Jehovah J? of Moses has become the " Our Father" 
of Jesus ! Ennobling sentiment ! sublime truth ! — a 
God of love is enthroned in the azure firmament ! 

The teachings of the representative Man alarmed the 
dwellers in the temple. Priesthood had shrewdness 
enough to perceive that if such doctrines were pro- 
mulgated the days of "the law and the prophets 5 ' 
were numbered, and fat heifers and lambs would no 
longer furnish them dainty nourishment. The Old Tes- 
tament rites and enactments, according to the express 
declarations of Christ, were no longer adapted to the 
advanced condition of mankind. The arbitrary power of 
the Jewish code was to cease ; it grew out of certain con- 
ditions, and when those conditions changed for the better 
they were no longer in force. Moral codes regulate 
themselves, and grow out of the ages which they in- 
fluence. Great crises in governments, civil and religious, 
deciding the fate of nations, generally cast off some old 
slough of superstition, and operate something new. There 
is an inherent element in society to regulate itself; an 
invisible leaven acting upon the mass of humanity, power- 
fully conservative in its nature,- — higher, holier, mightier 
than antique volume or ancient manuscript. It grows 
from the relationship existing between man and his Orig- 
inator, — between the human and the Universal Soul, — 
binds the lesser divinity to the greater. The Bible does 
not govern the universe ; it is not the conservative power 
that keeps the world in motion ; it is only the experience 
of a very proud and rebellious people, who had but little 



THE BIBLE. 113 

real reverence for Deity, or respect for humanity ; — a 
nation that scorned the common bond of fraternity, and 
mocked at the fatherhood of God. 

Self-righteousness, sanctified egotism, an inordinate and 
unscrupulous grasping after political aggrandizement, are 
their unmistakable characteristics. It is almost impos- 
sible for the unbiased reader of the Old Testament to 
arrive at any other conclusions. 

The Bible is called an " inspired volume." No vol- 
ume ever was or ever will be inspired. Inspiration is a 
feelings — a divine influx which can only be experienced 
by something that has life — a human soul. All men 
may be inspired, — the mental brain through which these 
thoughts flow has been inspired, and written its reflections 
concerning that inspiration ; but there is a difference be- 
tween the writing and the subject written about. Isaiah 
was inspired, and recorded his emotions, that others might 
read and be benefited ; but Jesus was more inspired than 
he, and has not left in writing a single word of the history 
of that inspiration. If he had prepared a volume, it 
would have been as much the word of God as the trans- 
lation which James the First has given the world, with 
the seal of infallibility attached. If this statement be 
true (and who can gainsay it?), then some of the " word 
of God" is lost, in which case the ostensible "word" 
cannot be perfect. 

But a very small portion of the history of inspiration 
and inspired persons has been perpetuated in books ; but 
yet sufficient to convince many that the conditions of 
inspiration are attainable. 

The Christian Testament is quite a different compilation 
10* 



114 THE BIBLE. 

from its predecessor. It brings to the present some idea 
of the influence which the new doctrines of Jesus exerted 
upon that age. It abounds with progressive thoughts and 
humanitarian sentiments. The apostles of that remarkable 
personage were slow to comprehend his expansive doc- 
trines ; they could not keep pace with his idea of salva- 
tion, or enter fully into the spirit of his benevolent 
philosophy. Their minds were not sufficiently developed 
to see the height, depth and breadth, of the reform 
which he proposed to effect. They could not fathom hi3 
pure and unselfish nature, or appreciate his moral maxims, 
even while enjoying the closest intimacy with him. 

Under the New Testament dispensation, the wholesale 
slaughter of dumb animals, as expiatory offerings, ceased. 
We hail this progression from dark barbarity with joy. 
The Old Testament, with its rivers of blood, had little 
worth to the followers of a better code. Old things had 
passed away, and all things become new. But so strong 
was the century-honored conception that blood was neces- 
sary to atone for sin, that it could not be eradicated at 
once, and Christ was regarded as an expiatory offering or 
human sacrifice. 

It was better that they should labor under this error 
than under thrice as many. The age progressed as fast 
as it could, and the teachings of Christ effected a great 
reform. Many of his sayings will live forever, because 
they are adapted to the conditions of the race. The 
golden rule of doing as we would be done by, no age in 
the future can outgrow. 

We conclude, then, that the Christian Testament is a 
useful book : and contains many valuable truths, aul 



THE BIBLE. 115 

prophecies calculated to make us hopeful for the time to 
come ; but is no more infallible than many other human 
productions. All things that require the mediation of 
mortal heads and hands are more or less imperfect. In- 
fallibility pertains to God only, and inspiration is conse- 
quent upon and coeval "with His existence. It cannot be 
limited to any period, any more than the light of to-day's 
sun can be bottled and preserved for the benefit of gener- 
ations yet to be born. It is an eternal sun shining upon 
humanity, and the opaque planet of priesthood can never 
eclipse it. 

If the inspiration of the present age be rejected by the 
churches, how can they believe in the inspiration of the 
past? If they repudiate the manifestations of to-day, 
how can they consistently receive those of other periods, 
and of a semi-barbarous people 1 If they believe not the 
testimony of the neighbor -whom they have seen, how 
shall they receive the testimony of men of other ages 
whom they have not seen, and of whose moral worth and 
reliability they know little or nothing? Reason shall 
judge the churches, and their reward shall be according 
to their works ; they will feel their punishment in dwarfed 
faculties and wants unsatisfied. The soul cannot content 
itself with a meagre history of other men's experiences ; 
it aspires to be able to record a happy experience of its 
own. It desires to realize the joys of inspiration as a 
vital truth. 



REGENERATION. 

Not a few persons who reject " modern miracles" 
with unqualified disdain, as being unworthy of attention 
and derogatory to manhood, strenuously profess to have 
been the subjects of a " miracle" themselves, according 
to their own rendering of the term. 

We allude to the subject of instantaneous regeneration. 
Let it be understood in the outset that we believe in re- 
generation, but not of the popular kind. The regener- 
ation which we advocate commences when the mind 
receives its first conceptions of truth. It may have its 
inceptive stages upon the earth, but its culminating point 
will never be reached — neither in this nor the next 
sphere. It is the Grand March of Humanity along the 
track over which Deity has passed. The glad yet solemn 
measure will be played as long- as there shall be an im- 
mortal foot to keep time over the highway of eternity. 
God himself heads the incalculable procession, and waves 
on with His sceptre the moving hosts, extending from the 
earth-shores far out into the ocean of the future home, 
dotting it through limitless time with lines of supernal 
beauty. 

Thus sweeps onward Regeneration in the wake of the 
Supreme, raising a great shout of joy. Regeneration is 
progress — and progress is not a thing of an hour or a 
day, but of all the ages that are before the soul. 



REGENERATION. 117 

The idea of an instantaneous change of the predomi- 
nating affections and character, predicated on the words of 
Jesus to Nicodemus, cannot well be understood as a just 
rendering of his meaning, or an assumption founded in the 
laws of Nature: "That which is born of the flesh is 
flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit.' 3 
How this declaration can be made to inculcate the doc- 
trine of the " new birth' ; while in the body, is a question 
yet to be satisfactorily answered. The affirmation is very 
plain, and it does not seem that any mistake ought to 
grow out of it relative to its import. That death was the 
birth referred to, is by no means a far-fetched or unrea- 
sonable conclusion. If a man be born of the spirit, he 
will be a spirit, and exist as such. " That which is born 
of the spirit is spirit," is language very pointed and per- 
tinent when applied to the separation of the soul from 
the body, and its introduction into the spirit world. He 
illustrates this beautiful conception by an apt allusion to 
* the natural birth, thus showing the analogy in the most 
forcible manner the case would admit. That the humane 
Reformer had any reference to a sudden and total change 
of the essential manhood, cannot legitimately be deduced. 
Nature could not be more completely violated; and, in fact, 
changing the ruling love, would be nearly equivalent to 
annihilation ; for the mind would not recognize its own 
identity after such a miraculous revolution. A regener- 
ation of this character would be fatal to the law of 
progress. If an individual's nature be thus suddenly 
metamorphosed, — so that he be made to hate what he 
loved, and love what he hated a second before, — then 
adieu to effort, for the great battle against error will be 



118 REGENERATION. 

fought, and an eternal victory won. The" subject of the 
wonder may sit down and pass eternity in dronish inac- 
tivity. A veritable " miracle" would be wrought. There 
will be no more painful conflicts with mundane inclina- 
tions. The "war in the members " is over, and all is 
done that can be done. Temptation has become a word 
without signification; for, God having given new affections 
and tendencies, there is no danger that the subject will- 
think or do wrong. Such transmutation of the gross into 
the pure is probably no more common than the trans- 
mutation of base metals into gold. Precious ores may be 
elaborated in the bowels of the earth by the process of 
ages ; and thus may the human spirit work itself pure. 

One cannot ascend to the top of a ladder without tread- 
ing the intervening rounds. Human regeneration is a 
ladder ; its foot is placed upon the earth, and its summit 
is lost in the cycle of eternal years. Regeneration will 
go on until the finger of Omnipotence has written innu- 
merable ages upon the hoary front of Time. No intel- ' 
ligence can calculate any given period when it will reach 
the Divine ideal, and cease its purifying work. Who, 
then, will presume to say that he has been regenerated ! 
In deep humility of soul we may all cry out, " Let the 
angelic process of regeneration have its uninterrupted 
work within us. May we every day receive some enno- 
bling thought, perform some act of charity, and live more 
in agreement with the laws of organic life ! " 

Be not an egotist in thy pretensions, inheritor of the 
mundane and incipient, but, girding on the breast-plate of 
righteousness and the sword of truth, pursue without 
fainting thy pilgrimage towards the sunny isles of peace 



REGENERATION. 119 

and purity. Eternal years are thine, yet thou hast no 
grain of time to lose upon the shore ; thy way is towards 
the distant summits where the infinite-orbed Sun per- 
meates in effulgent light. Enter, hopeful pilgrim, the 
temple of harmony, and incite thy own organism to send 
forth a responsive tone ; pause before the altar of charity, 
and leave there thy gift ; do honor to the gentle figure of 
Mercy, and forget not the " common bond and the common 
Giver." 

Wouldst thou be regenerated? Yield implicit obe- 
dience to the laws that have made thee a link in the 
universal chain of being. Make thyself familiar with 
that wondrous system of concord that preaches the serene 
will of Deity, in language delightful to the hopeful and 
cognizant ear. 

The following are among the reasons which we find for 
not believing in the sectarian idea of regeneration : 

1. God formed man as perfectly as conditions would 
admit, and adapted his organization (spiritual and phys- 
ical) to the duties which he was to perform. 

2. That the sin of Adam has nothing to do with his 
accountability to the Creator. 

3. That his spiritual nature is precisely as Deity 
made it ; therefore can possibly require no miraculous 
change. 

4. Progress is gradual, and by natural instrumental- 
ities. 

5. It is a law of Nature that we can arrive at no 
given height without passing over the intervening distance. 

6. There is no violation of law in the Divine govern- 
ment. 



120 REGENERATION. 

7. To live in harmony and communion with God, is to 
obey all the laws of organic being. 

8. That developed Manhood is the highest condition 
of humanity. 

9. That the ruling disposition cannot be changed 
without destroying the individuality, and putting an end 
to human effort. 

These axioms we quote from the natural scripture of 
the universe ; the most reliable authority we know of, 
and the most truthful exponent of the will of Deity. 
These propositions place us on a broad and rational plat- 
form, where we can contemplate the varied aspects around 
us with serene souls. Standing on the pinnacle of Na- 
ture, we gaze upon the kingdoms of superstition spread 
out at our feet, unmoved save by pity, unagitated but by 
beholding the misery produced by the works of error. 

The most tangible manifestations which Deity has made 
to man are seen in the manifold developments of Nature. 
Man is himself a part of Nature, and as God lives in the 
aggregated whole, it follows that everything is best as it 
was made ; and the feeling that any part is wrong, and 
needs radical alteration, is wholly factitious, and the re- 
sult of narrow views of the Divine Mind, and His plan of 
operation. 

Priesthood, and the organs of reverence and marvel- 
lousness too much excited, have done much towards 
marring the symmetry and beauty of natural Manhood. 
Certain misguided fanatics have been laboring for years to 
destroy the healthy equilibrium of the brain, — to make 
one organ assume the control and guidance of all the rest. 
One-sided men and women have been the result, who. 



REGENERATION. 121 

beholding everything through a diseased brain can only 
groan and sigh over evils that do not exist. Reverence 
and marvellousness attaining a monster size, through the 
combined influence of sectarian education, and extraordi- 
nary efforts on the part of religious teachers, let in upon 
the beautiful chambers of the soul a dark troop of gloomy 
and horrible images. The human face loses its cheerful 
expression, and becomes the index of hopeless despair \ it 
no longer reflects the pleasant smile, or gives utterance to 
happy thoughts. A fanatical and profane impiety has 
taken possession of the fair citadel where virtue makes 
its heaven. The duped mind is suffering the gnawing fire 
of a hell of its own making, and wasting its energies in a 
useless and unnatural labor. Factitious grief and need- 
less care wear their sores in the mental being, and fester 
in the intellect until the thoughts have an unsavory odor. 

The Indian in the forest, with a fully-developed body, 
and a strong, confiding belief in the Great Spirit, pre- 
sents a far better specimen of manhood than the dwarfed 
and deformed creature we have depicted. 

When will the great lesson of individual sovereignty 
be learned,— that every mind must do its own thinking, 
and work out its own salvation? Without thought the 
intellect cannot grow strong and healthy. Action to the 
mind is like exercise to the body — develops and gives 
energy. But mental action must not be of a partial or 
one-sided character ; all the faculties and sentiments must 
do their share of the work, or the manhood will not be 
in balance — it will languish. It is just as wise and 
natural to tie up the right hand and use only the left, as 
to restrain and keep down the legitimate functions of any 
11 



122 REGENERATION. 

part of the brain. The mind must be taught to rely on 
itself, and not upon others, or upon miraculous interven- 
tion. It is solely at the option of the individual whether 
the work of regeneration from error shall commence and 
go on rapidly or slowly. It is a life-long and eternity- 
long struggle for wisdom, usefulness, peace and purity. 

We have not yet seen a person who has been fully re- 
generated, and never shall ; such a phenomenon cannot be 
found this side of the Infallible Soul who doeth all things 
perfectly. * N 

The popular, sectarian, initiatory steps to regeneration, 
are as factitious and misdirected as the grand crisis as- 
pired to, itself. It is a baptism of agony, performed 
by stentorian preachers, over-officious parents and friends. 
We have seen the young, healthful and hopeful, driven 
from the sunny havens of Nature into the mad and 
tumbling waters of a sea of doubt and discord, where 
their life-barks were tossed by continual storm. Children 
who have violated no law, youths who have sinned neither 
against themselves nor others, green manhood at peace! 
with Nature, have been taught that they are unspeak- 
ably vile in the sight of God, and exposed to eternal dis- 
pleasure in the future state of existence. Denunciation 
follows denunciation, in rapid succession. Total depravity 
and original sin are heaped unsparingly upon the heads 
of the unhappy " chips from the old block" of Adam. I 

The subjects of these professors of salvation are finally 
duly excited; they wallow in misery, — riot in their dwn 
"lost estate," — see hell with its pains staring them in 
the face, — devils and ghastly goblins dancing through 
their dreams, and grinning into their imaginations^— the 



REGENERATION. 123 

u wrath of an offended God" hanging over them like a 
sword by a single hair. 

The psychological operators are delighted, for they love 
to be engaged in the work of ■" saving souls." We mean 
no disrespect ; many of them are sincere in these absurd 
pretensions. Worked to the highest note in the scale of 
excitement, a reaction takes place (for the power of the 
mind is exhausted), and the victims of this uncalled-for 
suffering are pronounced regenerated. Sometimes mag- 
netism plays largely its part in these conversions, es- 
pecially in those cases where the organization is very 
susceptible to that agency. These operations are pub- 
lished abroad, and triumphed over as " changes from 
nature to grace ;' ? as if the first was entirely wrong, and 
the latter the only thing needed to secure the happiness 
of all. 

Nature is that in which dwells the Creative Soul, and 
through which He embodies His ideal; if the ideal be 
^wrong, then its embodiment is. Man being one embodi- 
aent of God's ideal, the inference is obvious. Grace is 
favor ) and the favors of Deity are universal, — as demon- 
strated in the sunshine and rain. By grace or favor all 
creatures live. We should not be so blind and ungrateful 
as not to discover grace in the vital air which w T e respire, 
m the adaptability of things around us to our wants, in 
the wondrous gifts of the mind, the enjoyments we are 
capable of feeling, and in ennobling affections which dis- 
tinguish us from the lower creations. 

A healthy organization is an especial grace, and a 
sound mental system is a favor of w r hich men ought 
ever to be mindful. Every person has abundant rea- 



124 REGENERATION. 

son to praise and adore God that he has been blessed 
with an intelligent existence, — with the green fields of 
eternal life spread out before him. The Divine Archi- 
tect was good, superlatively good, in calling self-conscious 
beings into life, — just as they are, — with all their hopes, 
sentiments, passions. 

Manhood is a joy and a glory forever. Tongues of 
immortal eloquence would fail to utter the deep and soul- 
burning emotions of the spirit that contemplates its origin 
and destiny, as a conscious drop in the sea of humanity. 
We have felt kindred sensations, and longed for words in 
which to clothe our teeming thoughts, and pour out ex- 
haustless libations of praise. In seeking those chimerical 
blessings which are not for us, we neglect to render a just 
appreciation of those innumerable comforts and enjoy- 
ments which attend us at every step. 

Man is prone to aim at the extraordinary and unattain- 
able, and to scorn the simple ; while the true and useful 
is invariably simple. Here again, at the hazard of being 
deemed uncharitable, we must lay a part of this burden 
of error upon the shoulders of priesthood. Remedies 
easily procured are valued the least by the sick, and are 
seldom tried until the rare and expensive have been 
employed and failed to perform a cure. 

"Water, for instance, — one of the most conservative 
agents in Nature, — on account of its universality, is as 
universally despised as a curative. Many people wish to 
be healed of the leprosy of sin in some marvellous and 
uncommon way f a few simple rules will not suffice, — 
the common waters of salvation will not do to wash in 



REGENERATION. 125 

and become morally clean ; they must record some won- 
derful experience, out of the beaten track. 

We would not exhort men to "get religion" according 
to established custom,--— we would not so profane that 
sacred word ; but we would earnestly admonish our 
brethren to repent of their evil deeds, and to commence 
a real, heart-felt reform. The practice of religion we 
would be careful to enjoin upon all ; for it is a thing not 
to be obtained, but to be acted. The philanthropist, who 
goes about dispensing souj. and body relief to the poor 
and needy, is a living illustration of practical religion ; 
and, when such an example is discovered, you have found 
one in whom the saving work of regeneration is steadily 
progressing. 

By taking this common-sense view of the subject, we 
escape all those degrading excitements characteristic of 
" revival meetings," and which are so injurious to com- 
munity. The mind is not thrown from its healthy bal- 
ance, or robbed of its high prerogative of working out its 
own moral salvation. Reason is not insulted and repu- 
diated, and God becomes a kind and paternal being, doing 
the very best that conditions will allow for the regener- 
ation of the human race. Fanaticism and confusion 
vanish, canting and whining cease, and robust, graceful, 
dignified, just Manhood walks calmly into the field, ready 
to render to Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and to 
God the things that are God's. 

Reckon the sands upon the shores of countless seas, 
and then number the rolling ages of human regeneration. 
11* 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 

What is the object of spiritual beings in establishing a 
system of communication "with men in the body 1 Will 
not the expectations which tfcey ostensibly hold out de- 
lude honest inquirers for truth, lead astray the unwary, 
beguile the simple, scatter seeds of immorality, water 
the noxious plant of scepticism which has already taken 
root, confirm the unwise in their folly, contract the 
range of thought, circumscribe the powers of the mind, 
.and narrow the circle of human action '? 

These queries we will attempt to answer. If we have 
any comprehension of the matter under consideration, the 
mission of those invisible ones who tread unseen the 
yielding atmospheres around us, is to produce none of 
the evil consequences referred to ; — neither to disappoint 
the hopes of earnest and honest seekers for mental illu- 
mination, lead the toiling and weary pilgrims of earth 
into the dark caverns of error, or allure their inexpe- 
rienced feet to the rough and thorny paths of ignorance 
and sin. 

It is our sincere conviction that unfriendly spirits are 
not needed to sow the seeds of infidelity ; for, so far as we 
are capable of drawing just conclusions, the various con- 
flicting religious sects have done that work most thor- 
oughly, and reaped an abundant harvest. Folly, in its 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 127 

arrogant assumptions, will not be confirmed by these 
gentle visitants to man, nor will creeds be endorsed with 
the signature of infallibility. Instead of contracting the 
range of thought, or impeding the march of science, this 
ministry will promote both, nor pander to wickedness so 
much as to narrow the sphere of usefulness down to the 
cravings of human selfishness, which often seeks the seal 
of special sanctity and extraordinary privilege. 

The voices that are now speaking from the other state 
of being will direct, in language that cannot be mistaken, 
earnest seekers to the flowing waters where truth gushes 
spontaneous from the exhaustless fountains of Nature ; — 
induct him gradually into a broader temple of knowledge 
than his vision has yet contemplated. They will bid the 
unwise pause and ponder in their career of misdirection, 
and declare that manhood can only be attained by obe- 
dience to law, and that obedience to law is the pathway 
to enjoyment. They will encourage and develop a nat- 
ural theology which shall meet the wants of the race, 
rebuke the scoffer at inspiration, silence the sneers of the 
scorner, open prison-doors, set imprisoned minds at lib- 
erty, strike the fetters from the limbs of the oppressed, 
open the dull eyes of the philosophically blind, unclose 
ears now deaf to the voices of Nature, reiterate the soul- 
expanding doctrines of the Jewish Reformer, and endow 
the mind with a brighter faith. 

These kindly visitants will cheer the desponding ones 
who have sought in external organizations those spiritual 
aliments which are not to be found there ; they will com- 
fort those who mourn because of the virulence of secta- 
rian wrangles ; they will dispel with soothing tones of 



128 ANGELIC MINISTRY. 

wisdom the darkness that curtains the grave, and renders 
death a watch-word of horror to millions held in bondage 
to the myths of the Past, and the superstitions of the 
Present. 

When these messengers of peace shall have made 
themselves fully heard and felt, the future home of man- 
hood will be radiant with promise, and the close of life 
will be like a tranquil sunset. Demons of sectarian dis- 
cord will be cast out, and the fanaticism which has filled 
the earth with graves be exorcised, and laid in the re- 
motest sea of oblivion. Waning hope will revive like 
verdure in spring,, and dying faith lift up its drooping 
form. The deserts of the mind will blossom with beau- 
tiful ideas, like the gardens of paradise, and flowers of 
living fragrance expand where thistles of selfishness and 
weeds of error are growing. 

There are numberless minds engrossed in the pursuit 
of a rational and soul-satisfying system of ethics. Is not 
the thought a natural one, that those intelligences who 
have experienced the same sensations of doubt, fear and 
suspense, the same hard struggle for mental light, should 
reach forth their sympathies to those who are yet engaged 
in the conflict, and striving with all their faculties to 
grasp something tangible and tenable, on which to lay 
their hopes ? The contemplation of the mind's warfare 
must certainly call forth the ministrations of angels, if 
they yet possess a tithe of the affections that charac- 
terized their sojourn here. The morning and evening 
prayers that go up from hearts convulsed with uncer- 
tainty, cannot be lost ; they cannot fall back in cold, 
mocking, useless echoes. Their ceaseless cries for spirit- 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 129 

ual bread must needs be heard, and a stone will not be 
given in answer. Man's whole nature prays, with stream- 
ing tears, for food that will strengthen his inward being, 
that it grows not puny, weak and imbecile. 

Who can in his deepest soul pronounce it profane to 
indulge in the belief that the loved and departed will 
incline their ears in tenderness, responsive to human 
desire? The chain that links all existences cannot be 
snapped at death. Those who have entered upon the 
spiritual and intellectual life cannot be such ingrates as 
to forget those they loved in the form. The joys of 
heaven cannot make them so selfish, and the pains of hell 
cannot so blast and blacken them, as to root out all the 
natural ties ; and it is probable that a rational being 
never went into the other world without loving something 
or somebody. 

We see nothing contrary to Scripture in the idea of this 
intercourse ; on the contrary, we find much to confirm it. 
The Bible presents us with numberless phenomena which 
cannot well be accounted for on any other than the spirit- 
ual theory, unless the " automatic " of Dr. Rogers cut its 
fantastic antics in those days. Minds, we think it must 
be conceded, are governed by the same general laws in 
all ages. The odyle of Eeichenbach may have sustained 
as intimate a relation to the removal of the stone frojn 
the sepulchre of Jesus, as to inanimate articles of the 
present day, which find invisible means of locomotion. 
If we accept the " odyle" and the " automatic action," 
why not 1 We apprehend that the brain of Paul did not 
differ essentially from that of Tallmadge, Edmonds, or 
the author of the mundane theory. Principles apply to 




130 ANGELIC MINISTRY. 

all nations and ages. The law of gravitation was as much 
a fixed fact in the days of Moses and the prophets as it is 
now. If the " automatic" and the "odyle" account for 
strange phenomena in the nineteenth century, we suppose 
they would have done the same in the year of the world 
one thousand, had Dr. Rogers, Reichenbach, and other 
philosophers of modern times, been in existence to collate 
facts, and apply the gauge of ostensible science. 

If we are to deal with broad and all-grasping princi- 
ples, let us not pander to prevailing systems, or seek to 
be heard in the voice of the popular shout ; but make 
thorough and impartial work. Do not permit the patri- 
archs, prophets and apostles, to slip away from the 
" automatic," or escape the trial by "odyle." Be firm 
and self-possessed, and square down past revelations and 
phenomena by the all-conquering mundane agencies, till 
nothing be left but " science v on which a "saint" or 
"sinner" may hang a single hope for the future. Be- 
fore the physical forces, revered characters dissolve like 
men of straw. With the unintelligible agents of Nature, 
we can make all the angel visitations of the past the 
veriest mockery, — they fade like the deceitful mirage of 
the desert, leaving only the arid sands of despair where 
a golden city reared its minarets and domes to heaven a 
mpment since. 

These mundane instruments in our hands, we cause 
the mantle of prophecy to fall from the shoulders of the 
ancient seers, and reduce the noble proportions of the 
most God-like of the inspired, to the size of modern me- 
diums. This must be done, or the spiritual theory be 
accepted. We cannot see any other method of escape 



ANGELIC MINISTRY. 131 

from the dilemma into which sectarianism has been led 
by the ingenious champion of the "automatic" and 
"odyle." 

An angel appeared to Abram. The angel of the Lord 
found Hagar by a fountain of water in the wilderness. 
Angels visited Lot. "And there came two angels to 
Sodom at even." "Jacob went his way, and the angels of 
God met him." An angel spoke to Balaam in an audible 
voice. Angels announced the birth of Jesus, and mani- 
fested "good will to men." The spirits of Moses and 
Elias were seen at the transfiguration. Angels were dis- 
covered at the sepulchre. They also appeared to the 
apostles at various times, and once to Peter in a very 
signal manner. All these cases (which include but a 
small part of those named in the Bible) furnish us with 
instances of angelic ministration. They came to admon- 
ish, comfort and save, — just what we expect and claim 
for the mission of such beings. These manifestations 
were perfectly natural, and in violation of no law. The 
* supra -mundane visitants employed agents which they 
found in Nature to accomplish their purpose,— the 
" odyle" may have been one of them, for aught we know. 
Because "odyle" may perchance, under certain con- 
ditions, produce phenomena not marked by intelligence, 
such as the movement of tables, &c, it is no sufficient 
reason why it may not be used by beings possessing in- 
telligence for the purpose of manifesting that peculiarity. 
The clouds become charged with electricity and phe- 
nomena result — thunder and lightning; yet who will 
grasp this simple fact as a key to explain all other phe- 
nomena in which electricity plays a part? Would it 



132 ANGELIC MINISTRY. 

account for the intelligence displayed by the electric tele- 
graph ? Should we argue from such premises that elec- 
tricity possesses intelligence, or that the mind of the 
operator is the active agent in transmitting thoughts to 
New York ? 

This mode of reasoning we consider legitimate, al- 
though it may be rejected by those who have resolved, at 
all hazards, to explain away the manifestations that are 
now attracting attention in almost every country. Many 
have investigated in this manner, with a strong deter- 
mination to overthrow the spiritual theory. Such 
research is too common, and is a kind of science too 
cheap to be kept long in the market. The truth is, the 
explainers and exposers do not keep pace with the devel- 
opments. They would be forced to write an exposure 
every few days, in order to maintain a position, in the 
estimation of the world, as shrewd and far-reaching indi- 
viduals, and to keep in sight of the new and ascending 
phases of the subject under discussion. 

To believe that God " makes his angels ministering 
spirits," does violence neither to common sense nor man- 
hood ; and the affirmation is so well sustained by facts, 
that it is easier to receive than to reject it. To us, there 
is sweet solace in the thought that they stand by the 
couch of the dying in that dark hour when the agitated 
soul has so much need of strength, to breathe words of 
hope into his despairing bosom. We contemplate the in- 
visible ones turning back the tide of his despair, and 
changing the night of gloom into the day of calm hope. 
While men bend over the convulsed form, and speak of 
the frowns and fierce wrath of an offended Deity, they 






ANGELIC MINISTRY. 133 

whisper the thought of a better faith, and buoy up the 
subject of the transition on the wings of strong convic- 
tion. The cold waves of death's Jordan roll up against 
the trembling mortal, about to change his mode of exist- 
ence. He shudders, and looks to the spiritual leaders of 
the people for some gleam of comfort to light him on his 
uncertain way. His dim eyes meet solemn faces, and he 
sees stern and unpitying fingers pointing remorselessly 
back to the errors of the past. A modern Sinai thun- 
ders in his ears ; "an awful voice speaks from the murky 
cloud that overhangs the mountain of priesthood. It 
says : 

" Thou hast not made thy peace, — thou art not recon- 
ciled to God ! Thou hast lived the life of the impenitent. 
Before thee is the river of hell, and the pangs of un- 
quenchable thirst. Thou art tending darkly to the 
realm where the worm dieth not, and the fires of con- 
science go not out." 

Inexorable death, relax thy grasp a little ! Angel of 
dissolution, stay thy hand ! Gentler ministers are near, 
— softer voices are ready to speak, — a more sympathiz- 
ing wisdom will pour its balm upon thy bruised spirit. 
Passing pilgrim, trust in Our Father. Thou hast erred, 
it is true, but He is merciful. Thou hast been ignorant 
and selfish, and tasted the bitter fruits of both. Thou 
art not really dying, but entering upon an eternal ex- 
istence ; thy real marihood is about to burst its earthly 
shell, and seek a more expanded field of thought and 
action. Prepare to receive instruction from advanced 
intelligences, and to learn new and beautiful truths. 
Tremble not, wrestler with death ! for " except a man be 
12 



134 ANGELIC MINISTRY. 

born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. That 
which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is 
born of the spirit is spirit. " Thou art, being born of the 
spirit, traveller towards the land of celestial brightness. 
God is not thy enemy, — He will not afflict willingly, or 
crush thee into annihilation with His great strength. He 
is thy Father, thou art His erring child. One greater 
than thou has passed over this way of pain, and conse- 
crated the pathway of death. He gave utterance to those 
cheering words, u In my Father's house are many man- 
sions.' 7 Dying pilgrim, hasten to behold and inhabit 
those mansions ! 

It is thus that we love to picture angel ministers com- 
forting the passing soul, while visions of fadeless reality 
dawn upon the senses of the trembler upon the verge of 
the other sphere. The unseen ones stretch forth their 
hands more lovingly, smile more benignantly, utter en- 
couraging words. He sees, hears, believes, rejoices, and 
something more potent than intuition assures him that, if 
he dies in the external, he shall live again in the inter- 
nal, — arise from the. dying couch in newness of life, — 
in the glory of the new birth. Kejoice, soul ! break 
forth into singing, pilgrim ! the last enemy is destroyed. 
Death, where is thy pain? Grave, where is thy triumph? 

If thou wouldst die easy, traveller of eternal years ! 
be wise — be unselfish. Go about upon missions of 
charity and beneficence. Let thy neighbor be thy father 
and thy mother, and mankind thy brethren ; stretch forth 
thy hands toward them laden with good gifts, and say, 
" Behold them." Wouldst thou live happy, and pass the 
days till thy change come in calm tranquillity, in peaceful 



ANGELIC MINISTKY. 135 

hope, ill inward joy of spirit ? u Do unto others as thou 
wouldst that others should do unto thee." Such a life 
trill leave a remembrance to sweeten the bitterness of 
death, and linger around thy dying couch like the per- 
fumed breath of angels. Each good act, each kind word 
to the miserable, each smile to the outcast, each tear for 
the despairing, will return and be a rose beneath thy dis- 
solving frame. They will be a glorious bed for thee, and 
within every petal a loving angel shall rest. 

Unseen ministers bend in ceaseless watchfulness over 
the couches of those who sleep. They demonstrate their 
presence in prophetic dreams. With their invisible fin- 
gers they touch the sleeper's lips, and he smiles ; they 
whisper to his mental ear, and his soul hears and re- 
sponds ; they breathe softly over his brain, and a thousand 
f delightful images leap into life. He lives once more in 
the past, and his spirit joys to recognize the tones fa- 
miliar to him in other days ; or his inner being flows out 
into the great future, and he has a foretaste of celestial 
bliss. They sweep magically the strings of memory, and 
play sweet tunes upon the chords of the affections. He 
awakens, and knows that sleep has been to him the " gate 
of heaven.' 5 

Take not away from mankind the sanctifying belief in 
angelic visitation. Respect the Jewish and Christian 
Testaments enough for that, fallible and imperfect as they 
are. Yield deference enough to human veracity to sup- 
pose that many of the accounts contained in the Bible 
are true ; that there have been men in all ages capable of 
relating simple facts, without being the dupes of some 
subtle mockery. 



136 ANGELIC MINISTRY. 

Israel blessed the " angel of God who had redeemed 
him from all evil:" and Jesus, the model man of the ages, 
was strengthened and encouraged when his soul was ready 
to despair. The patriarchs and prophets, Christ and his 
apostles, were believers in this cheering doctrine, and we 
think the living generation may believe the same without 
much fear of insanity, or of being called stupid or cred- 
ulous. Those who thus believe will at least have illus- 
trious precedents. 

We sincerely hope, for the happiness of the race, that 
human beings will never imbibe an error more injurious 
to moral elevation, and the progress of science. Pro- 
fessed teachers of truth, of all other persons, should have 
a fixed and living faith in that great shield of immortal 
hearts which Our Father throws around His children to 
guard them, and beat their pulsations of love into their 
bosoms. They should not stop short of the reality of 
what they claim to endorse as gospel. They should not 
trust merely to their own impulses, but seek for tangible 
evidence of the vitality of spiritual communion. 



A VISION. 

The sun had gone down in grandeur, and his departed 
glory no longer flashed against the western heavens. 
Twilight passed, and the snowy moon, sailing up into the 
quiet skies, diffused a soft and pensive light. Stars looked 
serenely from the azure expanse, gemming the firmament 
like distant diamonds. The zephyrs that breathed over 
field and forest were charged with sweetness kissed from 
the dewy petals of fragrant flowers. The glad song of 
birds no longer awakened echoes in the heart, or wooed 
the feet to wander amid sylvan bowers. * * * * 

My mind was calm — my thoughts tranquil. If my 
spirit stretched forth her hands towards the unseen, my 
aspirations were not impious, and my desires neither wild 
nor reprehensible. If my heart expanded toward the de- 
parted, there was love in its enlargement, and humility in 
its throbbings. If I was a "link reluctant in a fleshly 
chain," I felt no rebellion within me, and no misanthropic 
bitterness gushed up from the springs of life. Submis- 
sion to the Cause of causes, resignation to the course of 
destiny, a subdued hope for good in the developments of 
the future, was the frame of mind that characterized the 
then existing conditions. 

I confessed no anxiety, and struggled for no forbidden 
knowledge. The hour and the circumstances were favor- 
12* 



138 a vision. 

able to the exhibition of invisible power. My eyelids 
closed, and the external vision was gone. There fell 
upon my spirit a great calm. A soft and dreamy tran-' 
quillity pervaded the mental brain, and, diffusing itself 
through my frame, quickened all my being. Instantly 
succeeding that deep serenity of soul, came a joy unspeak- 
able — a peace which passeth understanding. I was in 
the spirit, and its glorious baptism was upon me. The 
gross gave place to the subtile — the material to the 
spiritual. Every faculty of the mind was enlarged, — 
every power of the understanding rendered intensely 
acute. The things which are seen (of the external 
organism) faded from view, and the things which are 
unseen were apparent and known. A silvery light 
streamed through every avenue of my life, filling me 
with ineffable delight, and a longing to express my emo- 
tions. 

The strings of my tongue were unloosed. New and 
(to me) wonderful perceptions flowed forth with marvel- 
lous ease, in words most fitting and happily chosen. 
Having ceased from the external, I lived, breathed, 
thought and acted, within the deeply-charmed circle of 
the inner life, whose calm and joyous atmospheres impart 
to the kitiated soul a foretaste of its eternal future. 
An excellent wisdom and an eloquent utterance were 
given me ; I drank from fountains sweeter than the 
waters of Castalia, and my rejoicing feet stood upon a 
mountain higher than the summit of lofty Parnassus. 
My Helicon was fit drink for disenthralled immortals, and 
its inspiration breathed a sublimer voice to my spirit 



A VISION. 139 

than ever -wandering poet heard, or rapt improvisatore 
pronounced. 

Even after so long a lapse, when my mind reverts to 
that experience, it thrills to the soul of my being, and, 
metaphorically, I put off my sandals, and feel that I am 
dreading upon sacred ground, and almost within the area 
of the light of the burning bush, where invisible might 
held converse with mortal man. Magnificent conceptions 
of the Creative Deity attuned my vocal organs to notes 
of heartfelt praise. A benign, guiding intelligence as- 
sumed the control of my thoughts and of my person. 
My conceptions flowed into order, and harmony prevailed 
without and within. Borne on by the kindly governing 
mind, I strove to " wreak my thoughts upon expression, 
and embody that which was within me." 

My mind was turned to the contemplation of Deity and 
His attributes. A snowy light streamed from the auspi- 
cious skies, the regions of upper air. I was the object 
of those luminous rays ; they pulsated to the centre of 
my being, laden with diamonds of truth and pearls of 
beauty. 

"Feel and know," said the positive intelligence or 
guiding will, " the emotions with which the disenthralled 
from first conditions approach the Supreme Excellence. 
Behold Him existing in the dazzling atmospheres of His 
supernal heavens — the grand embodiment of benevo- 
lence and power. Perceive in Him centred, concentred 
and concentrated, all the attributes of love, wisdom and 
beauty. Know in Him the perfect Father of all intelli- 
gences — the Impartial Dispenser of good, the living Soul 
of Nature. The contemplation of His greatness and 



140 A VISION. 

beneficence, as continually displayed in new creations, fills 
the minds of wondering immortals with emotions of un- 
written joy. It is ordered, in the far-reaching wisdom of 
Deity, that the unfolding spirit shall find the elements of 
his unending bliss in the study of the works of Omnip-» 
otence. 

" Never, never idle ! ever, ever and unceasingly active 
in reforming matter, projecting systems and developing 
life, — eternally evolving wonders, Himself the sublimest 
wonder of all ! 

" Inconceivable benevolence ! Surely, our joy is des- 
tined to be of everlasting duration ; for no soul can echo 
the sound of sighing and sadness, who contemplates the 
loving manifestations of Our Father ; and every addi- 
tional development adds another voice of rejoicing to the 
universal song chanted by the infinite whole. The im- 
pressive paean is echoed from the arches of many heavens, 
and from the centres of many systems. 

" We watch, Tvith delight, the footsteps of God, marking 
His way with groups of worlds, leaving a divine aroma in 
the skies, and along the pathway of eternity through 
which He moves. We study His unfoldings, and our own 
natures expand for ever and ever. We are melted with 
love, enraptured with the varied developments around 
and above us, transported with sublimities which pene- 
trate our adoring hearts. We vainly search the mortal 
memory for means of expression ; we can find no perfect 
utterance ; the echoes of immortal thought will have still 
fainter echoes in the ears of rudimental beings. 

" Hark ! hear the angels proclaim this consoling truth: 
Children of the first sphere, behold in the ever-working 



A VISION. 141 

Deity your protecting Father; in Jesus, your elder 
brother, representing the sonhood of the race, destined to 
gather into one fold of fraternity all the wandering 
flocks of humanity ; and so, in the consummation of ages, 
there shall be but one shepherd and one fold, and, saved 
from ignorance and misdirection, all kindreds and tongues 
shall dwell together in unity, confessing no parent but 
God, and fearing no Satan but Error" 

The guiding will ceased, and impressed me with the 
thought that I should hold converse with friends whom I 
had once known in organism like my own, but who had 
cast off the slough of mortality, and passed to the second 
sphere of life, — that the disembodied and the wept-for 
would appear, speak to and through me. Immediately 
following the footprint of the impression, adown the stream 
of living light there came a shadowy form. Dim was 
he, and cloudy withal in his outlines. A pale, ethereal 
hand was outstretched, and my own leaped forth to grasp 
it. The rock of my* affections was smitten, and the 
waters gushed out. I called the appearance brother, — I 
pressed it to my heart, — bestowed endearing epithets. 

Quick as the motions of mind itself, the form disap- 
peared, — melted away from my inner vision,— stood no 
longer in phantom outline before me; it was embodied 
within, and formed a portion of myself ; and, acting pow- 
erfully upon my organs of speech, responded to what I 
felt, or would have asked. 

"I passed, J? said the figure, '-'from earthly conditions 
in an unexpected hour. My health was robust, my 
countenance rosy with life, my step firm and hopeful, 
when we last met upon your dim earth. I was suddenly 



142 A VISION. 

stricken by the hand of disease. Discord ran riot in iny 
frame ; inharmony prevailed. My faculties became dis- 
ordered, and my thoughts wandered into fantastic regions, 
where pain and darkness, and horrible fancies, lash the 
troubled waters of life to delirium. I suffered the pain and 
travail of the new birth, unconscious that I was trembling 
upon the brink of the future, and passing the most mys- 
terious of all ordeals. The soul was freed at length. A 
smiling being appeared, and spake, informing me of the 
change that had taken place, and of the new relations 
which now existed. He pointed to the earth, in confirm- 
ation of what he had affirmed. I saw a wonder and a 
marvel, — my own body, once so strong in its manhood, 
so confident in its strength, from which the scorching 
thirst, the torturing fever, the maddening pain, had 
wrenched the soul. Near my mortal part were weepers 
standing ; I saw, I recognized the sad picture of earthly 
death. And yet, strange anomaly ! I was living. I 
seemed an organized, thinking being. I had entered 
upon a new phase in my pilgrimage, and began to realize 
and sense the elements of an eternal existence. I was taken 
by surprise, because the light that now infiltrates your 
being never flowed into mine. I lived in and for the 
external ; I had not sought the conditions that now sur- 
round you ; hence, when the vast panorama of spiritual 
life burst upon my vision, it overwhelmed me with emo- 
tions hitherto unknown." 

The shadowy intelligence ceased to use my organs, and 
stood again before me. Raising his hand gracefully, 
while a loving smile played over his expressive lips, and 
affectionate glances beamed from his eyes, he placed the 



a vision. 143 

tips of his fingers upon the shoulder of another form 
that suddenly appeared, and expressed "with his counte- 
nance : — 

"Here is another whom you know," then, with a gen- 
tle inclination of the body, passed from sight. 

The mind now within my sphere was a young mother. 
She spoke of dear ties, apparently sundered by death. 
Her affections expanded towards her earthly offspring in 
words of tenderness that cannot well be recalled and ut- 
tered. To one who had sustained the most interesting 
of all relations, she earnestly requested me to give the 
following message of love : 

"Tell him," she said, with earnest emphasis, "tell 
him I live, — remember, do not forget, — tell him his 

M lives ; that I shall rise no more than I have 

already risen, — that the resurrection takes place at 
death. When I gazed back at the earth in the first 
wondering consciousness of my new existence, and be- 
held you bending with unutterable grief over my body, 
I was a completely organized, self-conscious being. 
Friendly voices greeted me upon the borders of the 
eternal shore, and kindly hands were put forth to assist 
my flight through the soft atmospheres of the new 
heaven. My affection for my children has not dissolved 
with the dissolving tenement ; I attend their inexpe- 
rienced footsteps in ceaseless watchfulness ; I keep un- 
tiring vigils over their pillowed heads ; I endeavor to 
reach all the avenues of their simple thoughts ; to guard 
them from evil ; to flow in with the good, the true, the 
pure. I have been successful ; I have impressed them 
to the utterance of wisdom far beyond their years. My 



144 A VISION. 

soul turns toward them with indescribable tenderness ; 
and the human mind cannot well conceive of the love of 
a spirit-mother for her children. Her maternal heart 
throbs unceasingly responsive to theirs; its loving pulsa- 
tions reach them in smiling dreams, and in elevated and 
tranquil thoughts." 

The young mother ceased, and introduced another in a 
similar manner. This intelligence purported to be a 
man whom I had known, but between whom and myself 
no particular reciprocity had existed. He alluded touch- 
ingly to the circumstance, and added : 

" Clogged no longer by the earthly organization, I learn 
now the capabilities of my own soul, and no longer mis- 
apprehend yours. While the present connection exists 
between us, you feel and appreciate the qualities of my 
mind, and I take the same cognizance of your own men- 
tality. We know each other, at last. I offer you my 
friendship, and, when you seem to hear my name whis- 
pered gently in your spiritual ear, know that I have come 
to hold silent communion and impart thoughts. I will 
visit you nightly ; the hand so strong when it held the 
hammer, so athletic when it smote upon the iron,* shall 
be laid as gently upon your forehead as the soft hand of 
a mother is pressed upon the brow of her slumbering 
infant." 

The shadow passed, and the spirit of Benjamin Frank- 
lin drew near. The guiding will impressed me to address 
him. 

"Is it thou/ 7 I asked, " master of thunder, great 
electrician, conqueror of lightning?" 

* This person had been a smith. 



A VISION. 145 

" Yes," he responded, with a benevolent smile, "it is 
Benjamin Franklin, the master of thunder. Men called 
me great ; my name is known in every land, and spoken 
W T ith reverence in every country. But I am flattered as 
little by human praise as I am intimidated by human 
censure. Earthly reputation is to me an atom incon- 
ceivably less (in comparison) than the smallest grain of 
sand that ever laid upon the sea-shore. I now dw T ell be- 
neath a sky whose only thunder is the still small voice 
of Deity, and whose only lightning is the electricity of 
God's love. I am engaged in loftier studies, in grander 
pursuits, than when a denizen of earth. I study God in 
his constant unfoldings, and adore His goodness and power 
in countless manifestations." 

I am forced to omit much that was said by this mind, 
and have represented him but feebly in what I have given. 
Next came, in succession, Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and 
Emanuel Swedenborg. The first confessed the possibility 
of a revelation from the spiritual to the natural world. 
He spoke with some warmth concerning the closing 
scenes of his life, and the light in which he has been 
regarded by religionists and the world at large ; but ap- 
peared to have risen to a plane of thought loving and 
lofty enough to overlook and forgive it all. He referred 
to some errors that characterized certain writings of his, 
and acknowledged the sonhood and mission of Jesus. 
But I would by no means give the idea that he endorsed 
the orthodox opinions of that personage. 

Emanuel Swedenborg declared, with solemn earnest- 
ness, "There is but one Eternal God, and Jesus Christ 
is His son." Pointing upward, he added. "My arcana 
13 



146 A VISION. 

does not contain the arcana of heaven. I see much pic- 
tured upon the radiant creations which was never written 
in books, or uttered by prophet or seer." 

Of all this intelligence said, only broken fragments 
remain, to remind me of something sublime and glorious. 
I pass on to the next manifestation. A towering form 
appeared. 

" What, Voltaire ! " I exclaimed, recoiling, still moved 
by the guiding will. My form was drawn up firmly and 
defiantly, while the presence, apparently, stood silent and 
grim. " Comest thou, with a dark form and a threatening 
aspect % Avaunt, thou infidel ! " I added. 

There was a moment of deeper silence; then the form, 
that had towered so threateningly before me, had com- 
mand of my being, controlled my members and my mind. 
How great the change ! how sudden the descent from the 
defiant to the gentle,! Throwing my person forward, and 
modulating my voice to its softest key, the intelligence 
purporting to be Voltaire uttered the following words ; 
breathing into them a feeling and pathos which I cannot 
describe. 

"The former things have passed away, and there has 
been created for me a new heaven and a new earth." 
He referred to Jesus of Nazareth as a wonderful per- 
sonage, and declared that he no longer wished to " crush 
the wretch ;" a favorite expression which he was wont to 
apply to the character alluded to. 

In giving the foregoing account, I have necessarily 
been obliged to omit the details, and have failed to give 
any part that life-like reality which invested it. I have 
been able to retain but a small portion of an experience 



A VISION. 147 

which occupied two hours. But a tithe of the communi- 
cations of the three last minds have been recalled and 
written ; for they were rapidly delivered, and would cover 
many pages. 

The following article may be called the burden of their 
remarks. I give it in the first person, in order to render 
it more real, and like the original. It is only intended 
to embody the general sentiment of the whole, and not 
as a verbatim report. It may perhaps give some faint 
idea of the thoughts and emotions of spiritual beings 
engaged in the study of the works of Deity. 

11 1 dwell beneath the bended dome of the new heaven ; 
I stand upon the elements of the new earth ; I respire 
softer airs ; I breathe diviner life ; I move in more har- 
monious circles. The jars and discords of the rudimental 
sphere do not reach me. The evils of the first earth ex- 
tend not to the ascending plane of being to which my 
wondering soul has reached. I feel within my inmost 
spirit a divine afflatus — a continually expanding joy — 
an ever-aspiring hope. I see onward written upon the 
glorious arch of the supernal skies ; I see progress en- 
graven upon the azure clouds of eternity, and in the 
hearts of deathless souls. I hear sweet harmony of 
sounds breathed from all creations, and uttered by all 
existences. The everlasting watchword of peace to 
all rational beings is echoed in tones of divine love 
throughout all the courts of the limitless expanse. I 
hear, in the w T ide arches of the measureless depths, no 
dissenting voices ; and the bright angel-hosts, with one 
accord, render their glad amens, and their songs of uni- 
versal good will. My soul swells with ecstasy unuttera- 



148 A VISION. 

ble, and an ineffable delight pulsates like living music 
amid the elements of my immortal being. 

"I see before me one unfathomable ocean of life ; but 1 
see no death that does not open to brighter being and 
serener life, among all the varied creations. 0, infinite 
sight ! grand scheme of impartial good ! all-pervading be- 
nevolence ! ever-ascending life ! ever-changing forms ! ye 
fill me with what words cannot seize upon and embody ! 
Where is the scribe that can write the revelation of in- 
numerable creations; the scripture of God's illimitable 
works ; the Bible of omnipotence ; the eternal book whose 
divine pages never uttered a lie ! 

" Your earth is but an atom among uncounted worlds, 
almost lost in the multiplicity of other and vaster crea- 
tions. Well mayest thou cry out, c What is man, that 
thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that thou re- 
gardest him ! Thou weighest the mountains in the hollow 
of Thine hand, and Thou takest up the isles as a very 
little thing.' 

"Turn thine eyes heavenward and see the stars pur- 
suing their way through trackless depths of ether ; behold 
the sun and the moon, pouring forth seas of light and 
heat. The sight fills thee with wonder, and I hear thee 
exclaim, ' Great is the mystery of created worlds ; sub- 
lime the secret of universal motion and eternal harmony ; 
measureless the extent of the broad universe.' 

" But thou hast seen nothing — thou hast felt nothing 
— thou hast conceived nothing, and no thought has entered 
into thy soul of that which is beyond thee ; of the worlds 
rolling in other atmospheres ; of planets revolving in 
other skies ; of suns shining in other systems ; of the ex- 



a vision. 149 

istences breathing upon other orbs ; the emotions swelling 
other hearts afar off, confessing the same Father, wor- 
shipping the same Deity, bowing before the same Al- 
mighty Wisdom. God's revelation is eternal, boundless, 
glorious and changeless as Himself. 

"It is the knowledge of these truths, and the percep- 
tions of these glories, that fill the souls of minds disen- 
thralled from the body with unspeakable wonder. They 
fall down and give praise to the creative Power who has 
evolved unnumbered creations, and endowed them all with 
the elements of good, and of ascending brightness. His 
greatness overwhelms us, and His love melts us, till 
every fibre of our immortal organism vibrates like the 
strings of well-tuned instruments ; casting our crowns 
before Him, sweet sounds of adoration burst forth to 
Him who liveth for ever and ever, formed the universal 
fabric that stretches from infinitude to infinitude, and 
sings the song of eternity and of life in all their unpictured 
and countless parts. 

"These are great conceptions ! Who among you is able 
to grasp them 1 They are but fragments of the ideas 
and emotions that employ the unfolding immortal, and 
attune his harp to ceaseless paeans ; they are but atoms 
of the wonders that lie revealed in the light of the sun 
of eternity. 

"You must come hither to this plane of existence, 
before you feel the thoughts that sublimely fill and en- 
rapture the most developed soul that travels among the 
hidden causes, and rests among the secret springs that 
Deity touches to keep the myriad systems in motion. I 
will pause and write joy on the revolving axles of all 
13* 



150 • A VISION. 

worlds, and engrave peace and harmony on the pillars of 
God's throne. I will stretch forth my hands and cry out 
hallelujah, hallelujah, gladness, gladness, glory ineflkble 



evermore 



I 



" The creative Deity reigneth, and the moving systems 
of worlds obey His voice, uttered' in stillness, breathed 
sublimely through infinity, carrying the principles of 
motion, order and life, to the centre and heart of all 
things. Sweet art thou, element of stillness, through 
which the ever-living Father utters His commandments ! 
Serene and blessed are the skies that pulsate to the deep 
respirations of the Almighty ! Radiant are the atmos- 
pheres that catch the first outgushings of the Divine fiats, 
and bear them to guide the destinies of all created things. 
And incomparably glorious art thou, inner heaven, 
where the Creative Soul unveils His face, and lays bare 
His counsels. It is enough ! Eye hath not seen, nor 
ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man to 
conceive of the beauties that gem the pathway of God, 
and the wonders that appear where He plants His foot- 
steps. 



THE MANHOOD OP JESUS. 

Jesus of Nazareth was an unrivalled specimen of Man- 
hood. His whole organization was musically accordant. 
Truth breathed through his being with seolian sweetness. 
He gave back the image of the Father with peculiar dis- 
tinctness. His personality seemed developed in every 
part. He was a natural man ; one organ did not act to 
the prejudice of another ; and we do not think it possible 
to find another individual so free from fanaticism and 
superstition. Indeed, these one-sided and baleful senti- 
ments appeared to have no utterance in him, and he was 
the most religious of men. We can discover no canting 
or ranting in his conversations and sermons, no mock 
solemnity in his ministry. He took the world as he found 
it, and allowed nothing to ruffle his equanimity of soul. 
The physical and mental forces were too nicely balanced 
to be disturbed. Like the loving Father, he moved on 
his way with a serene calmness that surprises us. He 
was sublime in his unaffected humility — God-like in his 
patience. He was not a man of sentiment merely, but of 
action. He did not sit down and sigh over the evils that 
were in the world, but put forth his hand to make them 
less. Ho was devoted to the charities and mercies of life, 
and glorified the Father by alleviating the sorrows and 
sufferings of those with whom he came in contact. He 



152 THE MANHOOD OF JESUS. 

preached doctrines of universal application, and his pure 
lips never emitted a sectarian whine, or gave voice to an 
hypocritical prayer. He was a grand republican and 
leveler; he wished to bring all God's children to the 
footing of a glorious democracy. He believed in no local 
Deity, and his philosophic soul was pained when he looked 
at the great temple and beheld deluded and bigoted men 
bowing the knee to a monstrous misconception. His na- 
ture yearned for the better day when humanity should 
worship in spirit, and in all places. He realized that 
the Jewish temple was not large enough for God to dwell ' 
in, — that His eternal heart could not beat once within 
its walls, — that He required Immensity for His habita- 
tion. 

When we consider the age in which Christ lived, we 
cannot but pronounce him the most remarkable personage 
that was ever the subject of history. He was not a book 
man; his knowledge was not limited to the law and the 
prophets — but the churchmen were thus fettered. He 
made the past no standard for the present or future. 
What Moses or Aaron said was neither law or gospel 
to him. He desired to improve the condition of man- 
kind, and not to establish the opinions of those who had 
been on the theatre of action before him. In the mind 
of Deity he existed long before Moses, as a model man. 
Jesus was above books and dogmatism. He felt within 
his accordant nature the power of making books ; no 
pen, ink and paper, came between him and the pure 
fountain-head of knowledge. He enjoyed what it is the 
privilege of true manhood to enjoy in every period — 
inspiration. He lived our example, — to show us what 



THE MANHOOD OF JESUS. 153 

we may become, and what a future age will be. when men 
obey the laws of their being. 

The moral courage of the Reformer of Nazareth is 
without parallel. He expressed himself in direct oppo- 
sition to the prevailing forms of worship. He called in 
question the wisdom of the law of Moses, and inculcated 
a system of ethics diametrically opposed to his. The pro- 
gressive principle with him was paramount; it displayed 
itself in all his sermons and life. He knew that the world 
ought to advance, and not rivet itself inexorably to the 
darker past. 

" It hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for 
a tooth ; but I say unto you, Whosoever smiteth thee on 
one cheek, turn to him the other also." 

Here was innovation, and the introduction of a religion 
of peace and forbearance, better adapted to the welfare 
of men. Where is the person who dares, at this period, 
oppose himself so directly and boldly to the conflicting 
religions of the earth ? Let him prepare himself for the 
fate of Jesus — a crown of thorns, and a painful cross. 
It seems to me that the appearance of another Christ 
would startle the churches more to-day, than it would 
those outside of them, who have not fastened their salva- 
tion upon paper creeds. We say this in all charity and 
seriousness, for we have no fountain of bitterness to pour 
out upon any sect. We would bias no individual, but ask 
each to obey the highest monitor that he finds within his 
own manhood; assured, if that manhood be well de- 
veloped, that truth and love will flow in, as into the organ- 
ism of Jesus. * 

We would not impress our convictions on any one 



154 THE MANHOOD OF JESUS. 

without reason. To his own master will every soul stand 
or fall — whether that master be self-love, superstition 
or ignorance. God is the supreme arbiter in these mat- 
ters. The character of Jesus is open to the examination 
of every inquiring mind, and his " peace" he is ready to 
give unto all who tread in his benevolent footsteps. 

It is not difficult to comprehend who are his disciples ; 
we have seen them in places of suffering and sorrow, and 
their natures were glorified with good- will and sympathy. 
Glorious art thou, Manhood ! We would delight to 
stand in thy presence with uncovered head and reverent 
attitude ! The world's history cannot produce aught 
more dazzling and beautiful. 

We feel that we cannot do justice to this personage. 
He excites an admiration which we cannot well express. 
His mild and affable bearing, gentle manners and genuine 
meekness, coupled with so much zeal, courage, devoted- 
ness and sublimity, fill us with unwritten w T onder. And 
yet Jesus was just what the Father made mankind to be 
universally, and rolling ages will develop humanity to 
that exalted plane. 

The principles of Nature will be known and obeyed, 
and a chain of sweet accord bind men in genial relations 
with the Father. 

Jesus, we listen to hear the footfall of thy spirit upon 
the new Mount Olives ! We pause to catch the musical 
echoes of thy voice upon the white sides of the living 
Mount Sion, and we long to hear the wings of the innu- 
merable company of angels to which the ages have come. 
Still preach to humanity thy sermons, on the sunny 
mount of Truth, and let the sound of thy teachings be 



THE MANHOOD OF JESUS. 155 

heard in the valleys of peace. The Nations wait to know 
thee, and realize in their own interiors the principles that 
made thee " one with the Father." Tongues and Peo- 
ples need to be reconciled to God and Nature, and to feel 
the joy of manhood. Let the accordant elements of thy 
calm philosophy flow upon humanity through innumer- 
able channels, until they mirror thy harmonious soul in 
its profoundest depths. 



LABOR. 

The time has passed when it was thought that clergy- 
men, only, could proclaim the science of God ; and the 
period is near, even at the doors, when it will be discov- 
ered that all classes of society are exponents of truth, and 
labor in the vineyard of the Lord. Nearly the whole 
civilized world is looking for a better day — a " millen- 
nium." It has been supposed that ministers alone could 
hasten on that happy Sabbath for mankind. But we can 
unfold a higher and more pertinent view of the subject. 
Every honest laborer in every department of industry 
helps to ameliorate the condition of the race, and expedite 
the "good time coming." The carpenter with his plane, 
the farmer with his hoe, the ship-builder with his axe, the 
inventor with his diagrams, — all do something towards the 
elevation of humanity. Labor-saving machinery hastens 
on the wished-for period. God performs all his wonders 
naturally ; He does not diverge from a straightforward 
course. Through the hand of man He will subjugate the 
earth, and make it blossom with flowers of beauty. The 
poor Irishman, at work in yonder soil with his spade, is 
one of the arms of God, rolling the mountains into the 
valleys, making the crooked straight, and the rough 
places smooth. 

It is labor that accomplishes wonders, and works out 



LABOR. . 157 

the salvation of humanity. Mechanics, farmers, artisans 
of all kinds, with strong hands, cheerful faces and honest 
hearts, you may work in the vineyard of the Great Hus- 
bandman, and perform your respective parts in the drama 
of life with as much acceptance as the man in the black 
coat and white cravat, who has thrice your salary. The 
high and the low may be co-laborers together in producing 
a conservative equilibrium in society. Each has his mis- 
sion to fulfil. There are no persons in existence who 
were made to be idle. All must act in some sphere or 
other; and he who acts well his part, be it ever so hum- 
ble, is equally entitled to the commendation of the Lord 
of the earth's harvest — "Well done, good and faithful 
servant; thou hast been faithful over few things, I will 
make thee ruler over many." 

The man who has nothing to do is yet to be created. 
God sets the great precedent of action : and, to be like 
Him, to develop the powers of manhood, mind or body, or 
both, must work. The important thing to be considered 
is this — to work w T isely, and not to the injury of others. 
Here is where men fail — one operates against another, 
and discord prevails ; they have not yet learned and prac- 
tised the true principles of consociation and fraternity. 
Labor should be so directed as to produce the greatest 
possible comfort and enjoyment for all. Selfishness over- 
rules right, and the world has been a vast arena in which 
a life and death struggle for dollars and cents has been 
going on for ages. 

It is time that the programme should change, and the 
curtain roll up and display a better scene. The change 
has already commenced, and is moving steadily on. The 
14 



158 LABOB. 

masses of the people begin to understand the ends and 
aims of existence. They are shaking off the shackles of 
apathy and ignorance, and the saying that knowledge is 
power, comes home to them with a deep significance. Free 
thought is doing its work, and will not cease to make 
itself heard and felt. The people will soon be their own 
governors and teachers ; and those who have governed 
and taught, finding their services no longer required, will 
fall into the general order of things, and acknowledge the 
principles of common brotherhood, which accords to every 
man equal rights and immunities. The people will be 
magnanimous, and the privileged class will not long mur- 
mur; but, tasting at the same fountain, put forth their 
energies cheerfully to assist in moving along the car of 
progress. 

The nobler sentiments will be cultivated, and men will 
vie with each other in deeds of greatness. Beneath the 
genial sun of brotherhood, the flower of manhood will 
speedily ripen ; angels will gaze upon it with rapture, and 
the sacred courts of Nature will be fragrant with its per- 
fume. The strong will assist the weak, and the w r eak will 
ultimately become strong, and able to help themselves. 
The ignorant will be instructed in sound and practical 
knowledge, and all will be religious without being fanat- 
ical, and serve God without dishonoring His character. 

Such will be the condition of the race, when properly- 
directed labor has carried it to the millennial period. 
Reader, when you pray that that time may be hastened, 
go immediately and do something that will bring some 
one below you, nearer to. a level with yourself; and an 
approving conscience will more than repay your effort. 



LABOR. 159 

God has certainly granted men the privilege of having 
a " millennium " just as soon as they can work it out; 
and he has given them reason, strength, science, wisdom 
and inspiration, to do it with. With these implements 
of power, they can accomplish the purposes of the benev- 
olent Father, and overcome the world's discords and 
angularities. 

Thus will obstacles be conquered by natural instru- 
mentalities, and the ages roll steadily onward to the full 
stature of manhood. 

. Will it be deemed strange that an easy and ennobling 
communication will then be permanently established with 
the celestial world, or that humanity should hold sweet 
converse with angels concerning the glory of the Infinite, 
and the wonders which His 'creations unfold to the eyes 
educated to behold evidences of His goodness in every 
form of beauty ? 

The prediction of such a period will be considered by 
many as a transcendental chimera, never destined to be- 
come a verity in the annals of human history. Reader, 
before that time has fully come, death will have removed 
the seal of mortality which now shuts out the revelations 
of the other life, and you will have looked upon the mov- 
ing machinery of Deity, by which He elevates peoples and 
tongues, and will know more of this subject than the hand 
that has recorded these prophecies. Labor and wait, — 
God will do all the rest. 



THE RELIGION OF MANHOOD. 

There is but one God, and but one religion. God is 
the organizing, structure-building, reconciling principle, 
permeating all Nature — dwelling in every part of im- 
mensity. The one and only true religion is the Religion 
of Manhood, is coeval and coexistent "with the race of 
mankind. It is the only universal religion, and is taught 
everywhere. It grows out of, belongs to, and is co- 
essential to the happiness of a self-conscious individual- 
ity, and cannot be desecrated without doing violence to 
the noblest attributes of the mind. The Religion of 
Manhood was the primitive one, and the climax at which 
Deity was aiming in the work of creation. 

We cannot well imagine that his ideal for the human 
state was any higher. Man was created with certain 
faculties, powers, sentiments and passions, to the intent 
that all should properly act, and each sustain its legit- 
imate relation to the other. A perfect balance of the 
physical and mental forces constitutes manhood. True 
manhood cannot exist where there is a subversion or de- 
rangement of the faculties. Every organ of the brain, 
every part of the body, every power of the soul, must 
preach their own natural, healthy gospel. The sentiment 
of reverence must make the being adore the Creator ; the 
organ of benevolence must prompt to deeds of charity 



THE RELIGION 01 MANHOOD. 161 

and kindness ; causality must make the mind aspire to a 
knowledge of the reason of things ; self-esteem impart 
dignity to the character ; combativeness endow the indi- 
vidual with firmness ; and so on to the end of the senti- 
ments and propensities. No faculty has been created 
without its use, and sin is the perversion of use. 

Gospel is glad tidings, which shall be unto all people 
when all people understand and obey the laws of their being. 
A completely accordant organism spontaneously declares 
the gospel of manhood. No physical or mental power 
should be perverted, slighted or scorned ; because God him- 
self has consecrated them to their several uses; and, when 
they act naturally, are eloquent exponents of His own 
musical nature. To serve the Divine Being properly, we 
have only to seek a just, perfect and beautiful balance of 
the physical and mental forces. It is this harmonious 
equilibrium that embodies the idea of the Religion of 
Manhood, which will make men prophets and priests unto 
God, and is a state of holiness and happiness. Than this 
condition, Deity has placed nothing better within the 
reach of humanity. 

The Religion of Manhood has its trinity of principles : 
they are Reason, Nature, Truth. Reason has the power 
of thought, forecast, calculation. It is that faculty that 
shows us our relation to the external world, a staff 
to support the mental fabric — the spinal column of hu- 
manity. Nature comprises all those harmonious man- 
ifestations of Deity w T hich make up the sum-total of the 
common revelation, irr which we study the benevolence, 
wisdom and power of the Creator. 

The contemplation of Nature begets within us a love 
14* 



162 THE RELIGION OF MANHOOD. 

and longing for Truth ; and Truth brings us into health- 
ful, joyous agreement with the universal Conservator. 

The Religion of Manhood cannot degenerate into fanat- 
icism, because it is based upon principles wholly antago- 
nistic to that enemy of the race. Dignity and grace are 
its inherent qualities : wisdom and power belong to it as 
a condition of its existence. Affability, courtesy, cheer- 
fulness and liberality, mark its development. Inspiration 
attends its footsteps, and makes them green with peren- 
nial verdure. It leaves in its pathway grateful recol- 
lections, happy thoughts, smiling faces, and blessings' 
without number. Its labor is to save others; its joy, to 
do good. Envy and parsimony are strangers to its heart. 
Jealousy and hatred are unknown in the history of its 
emotions. Hypocrisy is a guest never harbored. Reason 
is the throne on which it sits, Love the sceptre which it 
wields, and Consistency the jeweled crown upon its 
brows. Its kingdom is within itself; its subjects are its 
own faculties, its laws spontaneous, its revenue peace, 
its reign eternal, its motto labor, its destiny progression. 



THE ANGEL OF HOPE. 

There is a calm and placid angel that visits every 
earth, and respires in every heaven. She is fair of per- 
son and lovely of feature. She is called the Angel of 
Hope. She is found in the huts of poverty, and in the 
mansions of affluence. She sings her sweet songs to the 
most miserable outcast that has no place to lay his head, 
and to the proud and honored ones who occupy the high- 
est stations of power. She whispers in the ears of the 
starving creature who has no bread to eat, and to those 
whose tongues are parched with thirst. She takes them 
kindly by the hand, and smilingly points to the future. 
She says, " 0, poor and wretched children of want, there 
is good yet in store for you ; the time approaches when 
you shall no longer cry for the necessities of existence ; 
the hour cometh when Fortune shall visit you with her 
lapfull of plenty; when your bread shall be sure, and 
your water shall not fail ; when these tattered rags shall 
be exchanged for garments of beauty ; when pale hunger 
and the horrible demon of thirst shall no l'onger vex you ; 
when scorn shall cease to scoff at your misery, and pride 
to mock at your low estate." 

The sons and daughters of penury hear the musical 
tones of the comforting angel. Tears flow less freely; eyes 
beam more brightly : thin lips attempt to smile ; wasted 



164 THE ANGEL OF HOPE. 

cheeks blush with new life: downcast expressions pass 
away ; feeble hands are clasped in grateful anticipation, 
and faltering limbs grow strong. The despairing ones 
are ready to go on their way rejoicing, blessing the beau- 
tiful handmaiden of God, who has changed their night of 
darkness into the day of expectation. 

The Angel of Hope stands by the bed-side of the sick. 
She breathes upon them with her sweet breath ; she smiles 
with her fair lips; she lays her balmy hands upon them, 
and the diseased organism acknowledges a healing influ- 
ence ; the weary brain thinks more calmly ; the aching 
members are soothed to rest ; the laboring heart beats 
tranquilly ; there is a sabbath in the soul. The sick man 
ceases to sigh ; he folds his attenuated hands upon his 
breast, turns his eyes trustingly toward Heaven, and 
feels that all will be well; that nothing can go wrong. 
He kisses the hand that has wrought these benignant 
chancres, and the blessed ansrel smiles on him evermore. 

She is found in the prisons of earth ; she is seen kneel- 
ing beside the condemned to death ; she puts her hand 
beneath him, and lightens his chain: she places it softly 
under the cold links, that they may not press too heavily 
upon the limbs ; she addresses him as she has other in- 
heritors of sorrow, and her voice is soft as the descending 
snow : it ha§ no note of bitterness, no accent of reproach, 
no breathings of pride. She enters into converse with 
him as freely and as sympathetically as with the highest 
magnates of earth ; she embraces him lovingly, and drops 
tears upon his miserable head ; she pours the balm of 
consolation into his lacerated heart ; she soothes away his 
despair ; she kisses from his soul the horror of death ; 



THE ANGEL OF HOPE. 165 

she tells hini that God is more merciful than man ; that 
He forgives the penitent ; that He welcomes home the 
spirits of the prodigals of earth ; that angels rejoice 
when men sorrow for their sins ; that the passage to the 
future is short, and not so terrible as pictured in the 
minds of mortals. She quotes, with ineffable placidity of 
countenance, the words of Jesus to the dying malefactor, 
"This day shalt thou be with me in Paradise." The 
soul of the convict softens ; the fountains of his tears are 
open. Raising his streaming eyes, and elevating his 
manacled hands, he cries out, " Eemember me, now thou 
art in thy kingdom!" The angel breathes upon him still 
more serenely, and flows into all his being. He bows 
the doomed head, so miserable an hour before, and says, 
in subdued and humble accents, "The struggle is over; 
my spirit is resigned ; my mind tranquil ; I will die like 
a man ; lead me forth ! I am weak, but God is strong ; I 
am sinful, but He is mighty to forgive ; I am an erring 
son, but He is a most compassionate Father." 

The sweet angel, Hope, turns upon him a look of in- 
describable satisfaction ; she is transfigured before him : 
her face shines like the face of Jesus ; the skies open, 
and immortal intelligences seem to surround and minister 
unto her of their affections. But she withdraws not her 
gentle glances from the convict ; she supports him up the 
fatal steps ; she speaks to him while the cord is being 
adjusted, whispers in his ear when the cap is drawn; and, 
when he is suspended between the heavens and the earth, 
she places her hand upon his heart, and never removes it 
till it ceases to beat. She does not desert him even then; 
she is the first object that meets the vision of his spirit in 



166 THE ANGEL OF HOPE. 

his first awakenings from the pains of the new birth And 
she will be his companion through the long pilgrimage 
before him. 

The enslaved and oppressed are no strangers to the 
ministrations of the angel, Hope ; they have heard her 
soft footsteps in the cane-brake and in the rice-swamps, 
and felt her inspirations when fainting beneath the lash, 
and when scorching under the rays of tropical suns. 
Despair has fled at her approach, and resignation and an- 
ticipation have become guests in hearts too long the seat 
of anxiety and torturing fear. Hope is not weary in her 
work ; she labors as kindly for the degraded African as 
for the exalted prince. She well knows where are the 
theatres in which she is to act ; she speaks to the bond- 
man of a day of emancipation ; she causes him to see on 
the distant hill-tops of the future the dawning of a bet- 
ter order of things, — the light of the rising sun of equal- 
ity,— when the principles of universal brotherhood shall 
be confessed in all hearts. She assures him that the 
voice of the eternal Father proclaims this prophecy, and 
it cannot fail, — the elements of Divine love shall yet 
work out the salvation of the enslaver and the enslaved, 
— the scourge shall be buried, — chains grow rusty in 
unaccustomed places, — the whipping-post disappear, and 
be remembered only as the work of ignorance and misdi- 
rection. 

These changes will not be accomplished by the sword ; 
for it is wrong to make war ; and one wrong cannot mend 
another ; it is not in the nature of things. Reproofs and 
reproaches can never conquer errors ; but the power of 
universal benevolence can work wonders. It can level 



THE AXGEL OF HOPE. 167 

mountains of prejudice ; straighten the crooked places of 
human folly ; fill the dark valleys of ignorance with a 
"wisdom that will save from evil-doing. Sweet words for 
the ears of the slave ! sweet words for the ears of the en- 
slaver ! Speak on, placid Angel of Hope ! Speak on, 
that the soft distillings of thy voice may fall like healing 
ointment into wounded spirits. Never cease to utter thy 
prophecies ; never tire in doing a labor of mercy in every 
land where there is sorrow and sighing. Lift up thy 
white banner everywhere, and let it float in every sky 
that echoes the sound of sadness. Breathe thy inspira- 
tions alike to those who grope in darkness, and to those 
who revel in the light. Speak as lovingly to the op- 
pressor as to_the oppressed ; comfort him also with pre- 
sentiments of happy changes in governments, in societies, 
and in himself; echo the heavenly thought of universal 
brotherhood in all countries, and in all souls ; iterate in 
the secret chambers of his mind, that he shall yet think 
more wisely, and act more consistently with the interests 
of others. 

Welcome visitant to all minds ! secret guest of every 
home ! traveller through every land ! inspirer of all intel- 
ligences ! May all hearts acknowledge thy power, and 
rejoice at the beauty of thy countenance ; confessing, and 
confessing truly, that thou art the impartial friend of the 
human race, throwing thy balmy enchantments over all 
spirits, and reflecting, forever, unfading sunshine upon 
the pathway of life. 



PRACTICAL RELIGION. 

The world needs practical religion; it has had the 
theoretical and speculative too long for its good ; the form 
of godliness, without the indwelling substance. Words, 
mere empty words, winch are but air, have taken the 
place of weightier matters ■ — of equity between man and 
man. The churches have been vast receptacles of creeds, 
doctrines, hypotheses, which could not bless the race of 
mankind, and satisfy the wants of the soul. Sermons 
preached every seventh day in gilded pulpits will not fill 
the mouths of the starving with bread, give water to the 
thirsty, garments to cover the shivering limbs of the 
naked, comfort the hearts of the mourners who inhabit 
dens of wretchedness in filthy alleys, or carry good tid- 
ings to the sick, who despair and perish for want of 
proper nutriment and attention. 

The earth has been filled with sermons ; and yet Ini- 
quity walks abroad unabashed. Intemperance shows his 
bloated face in every street ; Selfishness stretches forth 
his greedy hand in all places ; Superstition sits upon the 
steps of the altar ; Bigotry points at the stake and the 
fagot; Ignorance exalts himself, and # exults in his folly; 
Oppression treads upon the necks of enslaved thousands, 
and the cry of squalid misery rises higher than the spires 
of temples professedly devoted to God. The heart of 



PRACTICAL RELIGION. 169 

humanity cries out for a change in prevailing institutions. 
It prays to the Creator of all things, that He would 
write His laws upon living souls, and engrave His com- 
mandments deep in the affections. There has grown to 
be an aristocracy in religion — a distinction between the 
well-dressed Christian, so-called, and the meanly-clad 
disciple. The former, in his costly apparel, shrinks from 
contact with the latter, lest he should be defiled. He feels 
that elegance and decency should be allowed to pursue 
their stately course to " heaven" uninterrupted by the 
" vulgar herd;" that his sympathies and aspirations are 
infinitely higher than those of the individual in the rus- 
set coat and unfashionable hat ; and he does not desire 
any nearer approach than the conventionalities of the 
upper circles of Christianity will allow. 

Men, professing to be followers of Jesus, have erected 
magnificent structures, and vainly thought that the In- 
finite Builder of countless systems of worlds would be 
well pleased with their costly offerings — condescend to 
dwell in their temples, and that they should thereafter be 
a favored people. Mistaken thought ! foolish conception ! 
The time has come when the Father must be worshipped 
in spirit and in truth ; for He seeketh such to serve Him ; 
H%will not dwell in temples made with human hands. 

Jesus never preached from gilded pulpits w T hen he 
" went about doing good," or knelt upon velvet cushions 
when he prayed to the benevolent God. He never wore 
such a costly garment as yonder priest has on. His 
guileless and elevated soul would have felt that he was 
robbing the poor. He cared nothing for outward show, 
nor the splendor that dazzles the eyes of men. He be- 
15 



170 PRACTICAL RELIGION. 

held, in a contrite and seeking spirit, the most glorious 
temple that humanity could rear for the Divine Mind to 
inhabit. 

There was something in. such an one that reached far 
above the proudest temple ever reared in the name of 
Heaven. Let the denizens of the earth erect no more 
magnificent dwellings in which to serve the impartial 
Father ; for He cannot be so acceptably served there as 
in the lowly dwellings of poverty and want. He is no 
respecter of persons. He loves the meanest of His crea- 
tions. He regards not the outward adornings of the 
body. He perceives in every intelligent existence one 
of His offspring, and the work of His wisdom. 

Temples reared by human effort will be swept away by 
the hand of time ; they will crumble and fall, and be no 
more. But the temple of the human soul, fashioned by 
the Eternal God, shall exist forever, and shine like the 
stars in the wide firmament, when the proudest monuments 
of earthly art shall have passed, and left no vestige behind 
to tell of their momentary greatness. Go, ye who would 
lavish thousands upon temples of wood and stone, seek 
out, beautify and adorn, the temples of eternal duration 
which languish in diseased and poverty-stricken bodies. 
If ye would be ministers of God, go and minister to tl^se 
who have need of your services, and let those who reward 
you for sermons, which are but words without meaning, 
reward you for going about to do good to the needy. Pull 
down your churches, and build homes for those who are 
homeless, and let your ministers be servants of all. Con- 
secrate a portion of the seventh day to visiting the sick from 
dwelling to dwelling, comforting the sorrowful, binding up 






PRACTICAL RELIGION, 171 

the broken-hearted, and you -will "preach the acceptable 
year of the Lord" in a voice louder than has been heard in 
the valleys and upon the mountains, since the days when 
Jesus preached upon the Mount of Olives, or by the Sea 
of Galilee. 

There is ineffable beauty and sublimity in acts like 
these. They elevate humanity, purify the soul, ennoble 
the character, strengthen the bond of brotherhood, and 
please God. These doctrines must prevail. They must 
be taught everywhere, — be sounded upon the high hills, 
and in the humble vales, — upon the house-top, and in 
the closet. They must resound, in tones of thunder, in 
the ears of the hypocrite and of the bigot ; startle the 
self-righteous from their sleep, and awaken the rich from 
their lethargy of idleness. They must cause the proud 
man to feel that, in the mind of Deity, he is no better than 
his poorest slave who drudges for him, half paid for his 
labor. 

Not until the pulpit becomes the sanctuary of the poor, 
the temple the home of the outcast, the priest the repre- 
sentative of charity, will true religion be of universal 
prevalence. The harvest truly is great, but the laborers 
are few. Pray ye, therefore, that the Eternal Lord of 
the ^harvest of humanity, will send forth more laborers, 
preeminently qualified for the work, — through whose man- 
hood shall flow serenest streams of love and wisdom from 
the world of causes. 

A new order of ministers will be consecrated to all that 
is good and ennobling, to the charities and to the mercies 
of life, and sent out into the wide fields of the world. 
They shall go forth weeping with those who weep, scat- 



172 PRACTICAL RELIGION. 

tering precious seeds of truth, which shall bear fruit in 
the soil of the human affections ; and when they return 
from their missions they will bring their sheaves with 
them. 

This harvest will be watched over by the Father of 
men, and an innumerable company of angelic intelli- 
gences. They will water the seeds of truth with the 
waters of wisdom, and assist to bind up the sheaves with 
the girdle of love. "Who among you will enter into 
this sublime field of labor ? Who will work in the vineyard 
of humanity when the mighty angel of wisdom shall put 
in his sickle to reap the earth ? J; Already is the sound 
of wings heard in the skies ; and skilful hands are at 
work upon the vintage, encouraging the efforts of the 
husbandmen ; and they will sing a song of gladness when 
it is safely garnered in the Eternal Home. 



THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 

When we contemplate the great Immensity in which 
all things are baptized ; when, gazing into the dim dis- 
tance, we behold mighty suns evolving palpitating oceans 
of light ; — moons, stars, earths, smiling mutually upon 
each other with a pale, soft, silvery glow, as if to reflect 
reciprocally the love and benevolence incarnated in each, 
and write in lines of glory an anthem to the Creative 
Deity ; — when we see worlds and attendant" satellites 
bound to their respective centres, as if riveted by inex- 
orable decree ; when we perceive systems balancing other 
systems, and finally an aggregate of the same moving 
about, a vast complicity of themselves, with undeviating 
accuracy; — we pause, and ask, in breathless awe, What is 
the object and design of these indescribable wanders ? 
Why do those great suns shine, and the planetary train 
reflect the glad smile of Omnipotence ? Why do these 
systems move accordantly in their incalculable cycles ? 
Briefly, what are we to understand by the operations of 
the stupendous whole? Are these infinite and varied 
creations the result of fortuitous circumstances, or what 
mortals call chance ? Did chance form suns, moons, stars 
and earths, with all their activities ? Is it the author of 
order, harmony, beauty, love, as manifested in every 
{base of infinitude ? The answer is distinct, evident ; 
15* 



174 THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 

it is, No — indubitably no. A higher, more glorious archi- 
tect framed the universe, and formed the multitudinous 
fabrics that render it an everlasting marvel and glory. A 
divine, far-reaching, omnipotent, intelligent principle, pro- 
jected and set in motion the extended whole. 

What was the design of the Sacred Being in evolving 
creations so grand and beautiful ? or, in other words, what 
is the destiny of matter ? If we are permitted to judge 
of the character of Deity by His works, as seen in every 
embodiment of His ideal, we may with confidence affirm, 
that He moves on in one eternal purpose. 

We assume the position, that the spiritualization of 
matter is the attainment after which Nature is aspiring ; 
and all the sublimities which we behold in the heavens 
and upon the earth are instrumentalities attending, and 
phenomena characterizing, the process. In suns we dis- 
cover mighty batteries acting with their light, heat and 
magnetism, upon planets to vitalize them. In mineral 
deposits we see lesser batteries beating pulses of life into 
gross materials, and flowing out in subtle streams of 
genial stimuli, to urge on the structure-building oper- 
ation universally. We perceive every form of vegetation 
bearing relation to other forms ; each organism con- 
nected with all others, and all the objects and principles 
of Nature forming one grand coalition, with a given pur- 
pose in view — the sublimation of matter. Inception, 
growth, maturity, death, decay, evaporation, are steps in 
Nature's chemistry, by which she purifies and makes 
matter ready for the highest condition. 

It must appear, upon reflection, that man's whole 
being once existed in gross matter ; consequently, in an 



THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 175 

unconscious state. The Creative, "Holy Spirit," acting 
upon it like a sun, conducted it through innumerable 
formations up to manhood. Man was once matter; 
therefore it is not unreasonable to suppose that the dust 
which we tread upon to-day, with the lower forms of life 
around us, will, in ages to come, be aroused to conscious- 
ness, and also become man. Taking this view of the 
subject, the declaration that God formed Adam from the 
dust of the earth has a deep significance. If we ex- 
amine the dust by the light of philosophy, we shall find 
that a great period of time was required to endow it with 
its distinguishing properties. It is composed of atoms or 
monads, in different states of refinement (with positive 
and negative poles), some of which are ready to enter 
into certain kinds of structure. The air also teems with 
atoms in a more advanced state of sublimation, prepared 
for uses in the divine, creative economy. Spiritualization 
is going on everywhere, without cessation. God is labor- 
ing to-day in the fields of immensity as tangibly and 
wisely as in the incalculable past. He is acting upon 
matter like a " refiner's fire," melting away all grossness, 
until the mass gives back a reflection of His own immortal 
image. The batteries of Omnipotence are sending forth 
life-imparting currents. Sun speaks to sun, planet to 
planet, system to system; atom calls harmoniously to 
atom, and all answer lovingly to their attractions. 

Obeying implicitly its impulses, matter continues its 
onward march, with its face turned eternally towards 
Deity. Its affinities are delightful, and it joys to follow 
them ; they are step3 leading towards consciousness. 
Atoms pass through an infinite variety of forms in reach- 



176 THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 

ing the condition of spirit. Every attraction that is felt 
and responded to renders them susceptible to a higher 
attraction, endows them with a more subtle life, and so 
on to the climax. 

The atoms in their upward journeyings never go wrong; 
a wisdom guides them that never errs ; Omnipotence di- 
rects their silent footsteps. All things are marching 
toward a perfection they can never reach ; for the loving 
Leader is forever in advance, leaving continually a brighter 
track behind Him, in his ceaseless pilgrimage. 

In one sense, all beings are coexistent, for matter is 
eternal. The germinal elements of your ow r n individual- 
ity might have existed side by side with those of your 
prime progenitor, Adam; but circumstances developed 
the latter first. 

Man is indeed u wonderfully made," and his creation 
has occupied a period which cannot be computed. Were 
he to " know himself," according to the old adage, he 
would comprehend more of the history of the universe 
than has yet appeared to his perceptions. His mind 
would be forced backward into the dim morning of the 
creation, when worlds were being located, polarity es- 
tablished, and law developed. The human existence will, 
perchance, be as long in studying his own being, and the 
changes through which he arrived at consciousness, as he 
was in being developed to his present condition. 

The structure-building Principle brings all things into 
relationship. " Thou mayest say to the worm thou art 
my brother, and to corruption, thou art my father and 
my mother." 

In thus attempting to contemplate the long pilgrimage 



THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 177 

of matter, we perceive its inceptive stages and its births, 
its varied deaths, its multiplied resurrections. We see it 
marching steadily upward, keeping time to the music of 
the animating Soul. We trace the process of refinement 
to a grand consummation, — the development of a self- 
conscious being, called man. But we have taken but a 
partial and imperfect survey of these interesting trans- 
formations, a complete history of which would make a 
library too large for a life of three-score years and ten to 
master, and would throw an effulgent light upon God and 
cosmogony. 

In the ages of the wide future it will be yours, reader, 
to study the volumes w T herein are recorded the processes 
by which the transforming God breathed upon the dust, 
and developed therefrom u a living soul." You will 
discover that God's " garden" is the Universe, his 
"Eden" Nature, his " evening and morning" a period 
to make the brain grow faint and dizzy. 

It has been observed in the march of atoms, that 
stronger attractions produced changes of form. The 
question naturally arises, Will not the human spirit, by 
the presentation of some stronger attraction, be forced to 
surrender a part of itself, and be destroyed — lose its 
identity, as have all forms below it 1 

We reply, the soul is philosophically immortal, and not 
incidentally or miraculously. If a miraculous interpo- 
sition be necessary to make men immortal, it inevitably 
follows that, if this interposition be not exerted in every 
case, annihilation must be the result. We think we can 
show a better reason than that of miracle for the soul's 
immortality. The human being, in his long journey to 



178 THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 

manhood, has passed through every conceivable change of 
matter, felt and answered all its attractions ; and, hav- 
ing done so, can never be called upon to feel and respond 
to them again. He has reached the condition of spirit 
to which all matter is tending, as its ultimatum — its in- 
destructible form, from which it can never go backward 
any more than Deity can cease to be. 

It is true that an intimate relation exists between mat- 
ter and spirit while the latter dwells in the body ; but it 
is the relation that exists between master and servant. 
The body is in all cases a slave to the soul ; the latter 
feels its superiority, and exerts it, yet lovingly lends to its 
earthly tabernacle form symmetry and beauty. It smiles 
benignantly from the lips, looks angelically from the eyes, 
thinks sublimely in the brain, manifests its undying affec- 
tions through the proper organs, hears acutely through 
the ears, sings and speaks divinely with the voice, per- 
forms deeds of kindness with the hands, goes about on 
missions of mercy upon the feet. It is thus that the in- 
destructible spirit asserts its supremacy over gross matter. 
It 'has nothing to dread from death ; it has experienced all 
the deaths in the universe, and outlived them. Water 
cannot drown, steel cannot wound, the furnace seven 
times heated cannot burn it; it has already passed 
through the furnace of Nature, and been refined above 
all other forms, in the crucible of the universe, acted upon 
by the chemicals of God. 

Sit thou in calm and placid triumph above all matter 
that is under thy feet, soul ! and ascribe praise and 
honor to the Creative Principle, the attractions of whose 



THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 179 

love thou art henceforth to feel, drawing thee to a loftier 
theatre of thought and action. 

The spirit of man is indestructible, then, because mat- 
ter, in more of its changes, can present an attraction so 
potent as its own. This is a consoling consideration. 
God is philosophical. Man is still to be governed by at- 
tractions, not mechanical, but moral and intellectual. 
The same general law prevails in every phase of progress, 
adapting all things to conditions, according to capacity, 
as observable while the germinal principles are passing 
from lower to higher forms. A man is susceptible of 
higher attractions than a monad ; the first is governed 
intellectually, the latter mechanically. 

It is man's duty to study Nature, — to acquire a 
knowledge of those conditions that surround him more 
immediately, and have relation to his physical being, — 
to understand that, to violate organic law, is to produce 
organic pain,— that to obey the higher inward attractions 
will produce emotions of exalted happiness. 

God flows to man in Nature, and through the divine 
mediation of Nature man becomes conscious of God. In 
this there is perfect concord. Deity reveals Himself to 
us as naturally as the air rushes into the lungs during 
respiration. When we study Nature, Ave study God. 
His book can be understood without commentaries. Every 
edition comes to us fresh from the press of His benevo- 
lence, revised by His own unerring hand. The book of 
Natuijp he does not commit to other control ; He prefers 
to prepare it Himself, lest one less skilful should make 
mistakes, and convey a falsehood to His children. He 
reads His own proof, and sets up the type of all the crea- 



180 THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 

tions ; His own innate potency supplies the power that 
works off the impressions of His glorious ideal, and in- 
terprets the emotions of His loving heart. 

The creative principle produces all changes that take 
place in matter. No other principle works to evolve 
forms. That puissant creation called the Devil, is un- 
known in the realms of philosophy. Truth disdains to 
know him. His earths, suns and moons, we have never 
seen, and know not where to find them. No evil princi- 
ple has any structure-building relation with matter ; it 
obeys but one voice, responds only to the call of one 
Divinity. The properties of matter combine to produce 
results obedient to the one infinite unity. 

When will human beings know Our Father ? When 
will they feel His smile in the rosy light, and His kisses 
in whispering breezes? When will they acknowledge 
His presence in the quiet beatings of the heart, and con- 
fess His inspiration in happy thoughts ? 

Inspiration is as natural as the sunshine and the flow- 
ers, the singing of birds and the flowing of water. The 
human spirit exists in the very atmosphere of inspiration. 
Under favorable conditions it has as much sympathy for 
the other state of existence as for this. It has an unde- 
niable claim to inspiration, — takes it as a part of its own 
inheritance, its birthright, which cannot much longer 
be sold by priesthood, for the unnutritious pottage of 
creeds. 

Religion is that duty which man owes to his neighbor, 
and, as has been said, is not predicated upon any partic- 
ular book, to stand or fall with that book. Like sun- 
shine and rain, it is a want of humanity, and to universal 



THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 181 

humanity belongs. It is a conservative element — a 
moral attraction to good acts, as legitimate as the physi- 
cal attractions to the germinal atoms. Strange, indeed, 
had gross matter been governed by forces adapted to its 
conditions and refined, spiritualized matter left without 
any system of government ! 

Religion, law, medicine, exist as natural necessities 
that cannot cease to be, and are as indispensable to man- 
kind as day and night are to labor and to rest. We 
would have man follow his higher instincts, nor fear that 
he will be degraded thereby. If God bestowed them, 
they were certainly given for use ; but if that anomalous 
being, denominated the Devil, endowed the race with the 
instinct of reason, then the Divine Being must have 
formed a co-partnership in the work of creation. Would 
a wise and skilful navigator place a pirate at the helm 
to guide his beautiful and otherwise well-manned ship 1 
Is it not more rational to suppose that he would put an 
experienced, honest and careful person in that position, 
inasmuch as the safety of crew and cargo depends upon 
the manner in which the vessel is guided on her way 
across the deep? Is it reasonable to believe that the 
Creator will permit a creature of " fathomless guile " to 
put a finishing hand to His most perfect work, and give 
it an instinct strong enough to govern its actions, and 
lead it forever out of its true and legitimate course? 
The dog follows its instinct and never goes wrong, and 
the same may be said of nearly the whole brute creation. 
Man, a higher embodiment of the Divine ideal, according 
to prevailing dogmas, follows the instinct of reason, is led 
16 



182 TilE DESTINY OF MATTER. 

astray, and baffles the benevolent designs of the Author 
of his existence. 

Reason is the magnet by which Deity attracts the hu- 
man spirit toward Himself, and which no one may fear to 
obey when it acts freely and naturally. All great dis- 
coveries have resulted from the employment of this fac- 
ulty. It is the key-stone of science — the rudder of the 
soul to direct its pathway over the sea of eternal years. 
No important inventions have originated among religious 
fanatics, for that holy attribute of the mind which works 
out difficult problems, has been contemned. We have 
never heard of a person's being injured by having too 
much reason ; but we have seen and heard of thousands 
of unfortunate individuals who were unfitted for the re- 
sponsibilities of life by being deprived of it. If reason is 
a curse and a dangerous gift, the quicker the world can 
be turned into a great lunatic asylum, the better. It is 
this that distinguishes between good and evil. When 
this ennobling endowment does not have its proper action, 
fanaticism instantly supplies its place. Reason is the 
white throne on which sits the Omnipotent God, who is 
versed in all arts, sciences and inventions. He is Him- 
self the great heart of science, and expects no result 
without a producing agent. Deprived of this distinguish- 
ing feature, no person could become a poet, painter, 
sculptor or musician ; and God is all of these. His poetry 
is seen in the motion of the heavenly bodies ; His painting 
is limned everywhere in Nature — upon the golden cloud 
and the lovely landscape. His sculpture is found in 
every form of beauty, and His music heard in the harmo- 
nious songs which all creations utter. 



THE DESTINY OF MATTER. 183 

Who will affirm that He can perform these wonders 
without the faculty of reason ? Shall we not then be 
perfect, even as our Father in heaven is perfect ? Must 
we not strive to imitate every excellency that we can dis- 
cover in the Divine character ? Should it not be our 
highest attraction, our holiest aspiration? Evidently, 
that which is excellent in Him will be excellent in us, so 
far as we are able to attain it. 

Having studied Deity in His varied manifestations, and 
learned some of His leading attributes, He will become the 
positive magnet by which we shall be attracted, and, feel- 
ing the loving force, we shall tread with joy the ascend- 
ing steps of Nature. 



AN ANCIENT RACE. 

There is a people in the world who may with pro- 
priety be termed the race of the Croakers. This genus 
of the type humanity is formidable in numbers ; but 
they do not possess any distinct nationality. Scorning 
consociation and consolidation for the purpose of building 
up a new republic or government, bearing upon it the 
impress of their own peculiar characteristics, they merge 
with all communities, societies and powers, and make 
themselves felt everywhere. Like the Thugs, they cling 
with life-long tenacity to the faith of their fathers and 
grandfathers ; and like the Arab c * prophet of God," are 
in favor of promulgating their peculiar systems by virtue 
of the sword — of persecution. 

The Croakers are a nervous, sleepless race, forever 
troubled lest the present state of things may not always 
continue. Their moral food consists mostly of musty 
parchments, ancient creeds, relics of the past (in a bad 
state of preservation), served up in the dish of popular- 
ity. They are rather beneath the ordinary size, intel- 
lectually, and much below, in stature, the maximum 
height of manhood. Their faces seldom express cheerful 
hope, for they live in continual expectation of something 
evil. Their principal employment is to oppose new 
things, and place obstacles in the way of progress. They 



AN ANCIENT RACE. 185 

are constantly on the qui vive in order to be the first to 
discover innovations upon established systems. They 
detest motions and commotions in the elements of society, 
especially those that tend to excite thought in the brain 
of the church. The race of the Croakers have constituted 
themselves a sort of moral police over the religious and 
intellectual world. They profess to stand firmly upon the 
rock of ages — truth — and to be models after which all 
men should pattern. They wish mundane affairs to be 
controlled with becoming stateliness — by themselves. 
They want Nature and creeds to travel on in the beaten 
track of ages, without falling out by the way, or finding 
fault with each other. They feel certain that the first is 
all wrong, and the last all right ; and, if either is to be 
condemned, not the latter. Nature, with them, is of little 
consequence; she is to be crossed and contradicted as 
much as possible, and so they crucify her daily, with a 
crown of thorns upon her head. They do not recognize 
in her the servant of the Most High ; but discover in her 
fair form only the enemy of " grace." 

They think they have attained to all necessary knowl- 
edge, and a " doubt" is a " temptation." The Croakers 
pretend to some knowledge of mental physic, and can feel 
the pulse of community and tell whether it beats healthily. 
Every little fluttering in the arteries of progress is magni- 
fied into a malignant fever, and bitter herbs of sectarian- 
ism are hastily prescribed. If the patient tastes, makes 
a wry face, and refuses to swallow the drug, it is instantly 
forced down his throat — in defiance of entreaties, 
struggles, and strangulation. In this manner many 
reformatory excitements have been, for the time, allayed. 
16* 



186 AN ANCIENT RACE. 

The race of the Groakers are of a long line of ancestry. 
They are related to superstition in a direct descent ; and 
there is a family connection of the closest intimacy exist- 
ing between three gray-bearded old personages, pretty 
generally known by the respective names of Ignorance, 
Bigotry, and Fanaticism. Their coat of arms is a pile 
gules on a field argent, in conjunction with a human 
figure curiously enveloped in flames, and a black car 
rolling over grinning skulls. In the background is the 
Inquisition rampant, and in the prospective the church 
couchant, decked with orders and symbols of authority. 

This singular race has croaked in all ages, and even at 
the foot of sacred Sinai. Moses did not wholly escape 
their opposition ; • — they laid hold of his mantle and kept 
him back, lest he should go "-too fast." They croaked 
at every fresh step of Progression from Sinai to Mount 
Olives, and assisted to prepare that awful baptism of 
blood for the inspired Man. 

Innovation is the enemy against which they fight, and 
have fought, in every onward phase of humanity. One 
peculiarity of the race should be noticed ; they can only 
croak at. new things, without the ability to suggest better. 
The clamor which they delight to raise is all sound ; no 
divine speech — no attempt at simple candor — no offer at 
investigation. 

They anticipate all failures, predict all public catastro- 
phes, and see the frown of Omnipotence pictured on every 
cloud. Their scientific spectacles are so accommodatingly 
constructed that they magnify evils, and minnify virtues, 
when they look at new things. They are egotists ; they 
consider their meagre word authority in all cases. They 



AN ANCIENT RACE. 187 

know that mysteries must be let alone. It is very well 
understood by them that the spiritual sphere is in duty 
bound to conduct itself with decorum, and has no kind 
of right to let loose upon the world a troop of " departed 
friends" to comfort people with messages of love. When 
beloved parents, children, husbands and wives, get well 
out of this " state of trial," they ought to stay out, like 
exemplary and sober ghosts. What do they want to 
" come back" for? Don't we know all that is necessary? 
We don't want our chairs and tables to walk about, nor 
our brains to be inspired ! 

The Croakers never go on long intellectual journeys, 
but travel forever in a circle. They remind one of a 
horse in a tread-mill, going round and round, pulling 
eternally at the lever of one idea, — thinking to move the 
world and astonish all nations, when in reality they are 
only turning a diminutive mill, grinding out secta- 
rianism. 

They hate free discussion of theological themes ; the 
people are not competent to do their own thinking ; those 
must think for them who are paid to do so. It won't 
answer for the vulgar masses to perplex their brains about 
subjects which those intellectual giants, with salaries of 
three thousand a year, can scarcely grapple with. This 
ancient people are fearful that the world will be turned 
upside down by some new-fangled notion. They look 
upon Reform as some horrible monster, called up from 
the infernal pit, to disfigure the world with his sacrile- 
gious foot-prints. They croak whenever they see his 
stately front, and hide themselves in their theological 



188 AN ANCIENT RACE. 

work-shops, lest they should be crushed beneath his steps, 
as he marches forth to work mighty changes. 

Fortunately, the race of the Croakers is not hardy and 
strong. They are not men who can do battle gallantly 
and bravely, but a cowardly tribe. They cannot wield 
the sword of truth, or sling the stone of conviction. 
Though they croak with the strength of a Goliah, a David 
can frighten them from the field. At present there is a 
great commotion among them. They are calling upon 
the mountains of the law to fall upon modern spiritual- 
ism, and crush it. It is driving men and women to in- 
sanity ; it must be beheaded before it grows any larger. 
A child can be strangled more readily than an individual 
who has attained to the full stature of manhood. Some 
cry "jugglery," some " demonology," and all unite in 
one grand croak that it must be crucified. 

The days of physical martyrdom have passed. The 
fagot, the stake, the halter and the rack, have done their 
baleful work. The crown of thorns is not reserved for 
the heads of the present generation ; it is laid away 
among other relics of barbarous ages ; it can vex the 
souls of the righteous no more; it cannot longer convulse 
seeking minds with fear ; its agony and its tears are 
among the things that were, and shall be remembered as 
a horrible dream over which Christian charity must try 
to spread the folds of its mantle. 

Like the grim and impotent giant Despair, the Croak- 
ers can only sit in the caves of their folly, and grimace 
in helpless inefficiency. Let them mock on until the day 
of the world's redemption dawns so brightly that their 
narrow vision shall be dazzled by the light. Let them 



AN ANCIENT RACE. 189 

predict evil until the good which devout men have prayed 
for shall have come, and blessed aspiring souls with a 
foretaste of heavenly joy. Let them revolve in their 
narrow circle of bigotry, where they vainly strive to 
grind away the face of Truth, until a wider philosophy 
shall stretch forth its kindly arms to embrace them — 
until the angel of Wisdom, with one foot upon the sea of 
human folly and the other upon the foul earth of super- 
stition, shall blow the golden trumpet of universal love, to 
gather in all nations, kindreds and families of humanity, 
that they may form one brotherhood, and acknowledge 
one benevolent Father ! Then will a new song be put 
into their mouths, and they will remember the former 
things no more. 



SECTARIANISM. 

Humanity has one great enemy, more hideous than 
the " beast with seven heads and ten horns," discoursed 
of in the Jewish Testament. This adversary is not the 
ubiquitous devil of popular superstition, — not the com- 
mon terror of children, — not the " original sin " so shock- 
ing to the contemplation of fanatical bigots, — but the devil 
of Sectarianism ; a demon who performs a labor of wick- 
edness, and delights in the sound of conflict. Sectarian- 
ism has long had his home with men, and lived upon 
their sweat and toil. He is a strong and greedy monster, 
preying upon the heart of humanity. His footsteps, like 
those of the wandering Jew, have pressed the soil of every 
country, and scattered the seeds of war and misery in 
every land. He is older than the age of Moses, is cursed 
with the dark nature of Cain, and a lust after power more 
insatiable than the unholy appetites of the children of 
Sodom. He lives upon spoil, and his daily food is moist- 
ened by the bloody drops wrung from hearts oppressed 
and broken. His way from the Past to the Present is 
red with carnage, and paved with bleaching bones. He 
has made God's earth a battle-field, and forged the war- 
rant of the Almighty to palliate his enormities. His 
pathway is full of despair, and maniacs sit by the way- 
side grinning and gibbering. Violence and Perversion 



SECTARIANISM. 191 

are his yoke-fellows, plunder his vocation, strife the ele- 
ment in which he loves to respire. He is pitiless in his 
decrees, inexorable in his purposes, and the sword is a 
weapon fitted and familiar to his hand. 

He is a bigot and an egotist. His confidence in his own 
power with God borders on insane vanity, and the " keys 
of death and hell are his daily playthings." Sectarian- 
ism is one of the ambitious ones of earth, and aspires to 
supreme authority. He is a sleepless conspirator, and 
keeps the world in continual agitation by his intrigues 
and cabals. He compasses the four cardinal points of 
the earth, to make proselytes to swell the number of his 
adherents and followers. 

He has a life-lease of all the pulpits in the country, 
and disseminates his doctrines therein. He cries peace 
and makes strife ) preaches equality and goes out to whip 
his slaves, talks about charity and robs the poor. He 
discourses eloquently concerning the sin of Adam, with- 
out making a single legitimate effort to remedy the evils 
of the present day. He bases all truth upon a book, but, 
strange to say, goes about forming organizations to be 
governed by creeds, all ostensibly predicated upon said 
book, yet each conflicting with the other to such an 
extent that the most bitter disputations and animosities 
ensue, converting whole communities into theological and 
civil battle-fields, spreading direst discord and unhappi- 
ness. 

In the hands of Sectarianism, the Bible becomes a 
harp of many strings, upon which he can play innumer- 
able tunes,^ to suit the ^rs of minds of any complexion. 
He strikes his instrument grave or gay. rough or soft, 



102 SECTARIANISM. 

from the softest lullaby that ever soothed a soul to sleep, 
to the loudest clamor that cheers charging hosts to battle. 

This varied harping is the grand secret of his success, 
for he is able to accommodate all tastes, and make a pleas- 
ing melody to all, however dissimilar their prejudices and 
organizations. He says M here is your standard/' and 
" here is the best interpretation of it." This he repeats 
everywhere, scattering his antagonistic " interpretations " 
with a bold hand, broad-cast. 

This inveterate itinerant, travels from spot to spot, 
grinding out theological music according to circumstances, 
sure of a welcome among all denominations, which he has 
been busy in building up. He harps it merrily, and they 
dance the measure like obedient vassals; while he is sure 
to impress upon each organization that their style of 
" stepping it' 5 is the best. 

He plays " Infallibility " to the church of Rome; 
" Predestination, Election, Infant Damnation and Im- 
mersion," to the disciples of Calvin; to the Quakers he 
harps the melody of " No Baptism with Water;" to 
another denomination, " Sprinkling and Infant Baptism ; " 
to a fifth, " Eternal Misery ; " to a sixth, " Universal 
Salvation ; " a seventh, " Free Will ; " an eighth, u Per- 
fection ;" a ninth, the " Second Advent." while there are 
a few tunes of general application among Protestants, such 
as " New Birth, Total Depravity, Original Sin, The 
Trinity," &c. 

Now, is it singular that, with all this harping, minds 
truly honest and earnest should be utterly confounded 
and disgusted ? Can the calnwmd rational juan fail to 
perceive, if he exercises his best faculties, that there is a 
fundamental wrong somewhere ? Will he not inevitably 



SECTARIANISM. 193 

arrive at the conclusion that the darker past furnishes no 
infallible authority, or that it is shamefully and unblush- 
ingly perverted ? It is morally impossible for the unprej- 
udiced person to look around upon the different religions, 
•without feeling in his soul a real doubt in regard to the 
usefulness of any one of them. 

The earth has been cursed with mysteries. Human 
opinions, relating to theological subjects, have kept the 
world in a turmoil for thousands of years. Humanity 
has literally waded in blood for ages, — with the ostensi- 
ble purpose of pleasing God, but in truth to pander to 
sectarianism and selfishness. 

"We may with justice paraphrase the beautiful words 
of the heroic and amiable Madame Roland : u 0, Religion ! 
how many crimes are committed in thy name ! M 

Sectarianism is the Judas by which Jesus is betrayed. 
The days of this discordant demon draw near " the time, 
of the end." The long rope of duplicity, which he has 
been twisting, will hang him upon the tree of dissension 
he has planted. 

The disciples of true religion will rejoice at his death, 
and thereafter no creeds will be written upon paper, but 
upon immortal souls. Men will serve God from the 
deepest impulses of their nature, and the sun of right- 
eousness will arise upon humanity with healing power in 
the wings of his light. The forms of worship "will be 
spontaneous, ' and appropriate to all circumstances and 
occasions. The principles of eternal rectitude will find 
utterance " in spirit" and not in ink. 

Upon the grave of Sectarianism we would write — 

" He was the friend of Strife and the enemy of Man." 



THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 

In contemplating the developments of the present day, 
many peculiarities are recognized by the candid and 
rational mind. The observing investigator arrives at the 
obvious conclusion that there are three striking modes 
of manifestation : The physical, mechanical and 

MENTAL. 

The distinction intended to be made between the two 
first, is simply that one relates to the movement of inani- 
mate things, and the other to the control of any part of 
the human body without the volition of the legitimate 
owner. The physical and mechanical phases display the 
power which invisible agencies have over some of the 
grosser elements of nature, by which they are able to 
produce external effects as real and tangible as those 
resulting from the exerted force of a human arm, or any 
other mundane power. 

The Mental phase relates to the intellectual and im- 
/mortal principle in man, and is operated by the mediation 
i of more subtile elements. It requires the following con- 
editions for its full development : 
\ A healthy body. 

A good phrenological development. 

It will be influenced and rendered more or less imper- 
fect by the following peculiarities : 



THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 195 

Ignorance. 

Superstition. 

Educational bias. 

Society. 

Perversion of faculties and functions. 

Mental manifestation has innumerable steps and stages 
of development, according to the organization of the sub- 
ject. If the phrenological development be bad, so that 
the accompanying mind itself is discordant in its opera- 
tions, it cannot be expected that another intelligence, not 
permanently connected with it, can control harmoniously 
and successfully. 

In the good phrenological brain, healthy organism, 
and well-balanced mind, mental expansion will go on 
rapidly and pleasantly ; there will be no action without 
harmony, no words without wisdom, — nothing to lessen 
the self-respect of the medium, or make him feel that his 
powers are debased. 

Mental mediumship is desirable on many accounts ; it 
expands the mind and quickens the thoughts. When law 
is obeyed, it (the mental phase) opens the pathway to 
science, philosophy and enjoyment. Men will be fully 
inspired as soon as they reach the plane of evident inspir- 
ation, by the observance of certain conditions which have 
relation to the physical and mental being. 

There will inevitably be much that is valueless in the 
developments of the present century. When it is con- 
sidered to how many influences the mind is liable, and 
how imperfectly the moral, intellectual, and bodily attri- 
butes of mankind are developed, it cannot be deemed 
singular that Folly should occasionally reign supreme. 



196 THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 

We are by no means ready or willing to attribute all that 
is seen and heard to spiritual agency. We prefer to 
fasten many of the errors laid upon the shoulders of 
spiritualism, upon the skirts of poor humanity in the 
body. 

That which is wise and angelic will not degrade manhood, 
or prostitute either soul or body to ridiculous uses. We 
would advise no person to connect himself with, or encour- 
age by his presence, gatherings which do not edify by 
their proceedings, or exalt by their teachings. This is 
the true standard by which every sensible man will be 
governed. Avoid the old sectarian whine, and the abject 
spirit that kisses the hand of Ignorance that smites him, 
and licks the feet of Superstition that treads upon and 
crushes him. 

Mental development goes on in all places when truly 
sought. The closet is the best place, with the mind at 
rest and calm, — unless the circle be perfectly and recipro- 
cally congenial - — a state of things rarely prevalent. 

More depends on the subject's own mind than on cir- 
cles. No long pilgrimages, painful penances, or feverish 
effort, are needful. He is unwise who spends his time, 
neglects his business, and gives himself insanely to the 
pursuit of " development." 

Such a course effectually retards the process desired, 
disturbs the tranquillity of the mind, and is attended with 
consequences every way detrimental to health, prosperity, 
and happiness. 

Be temperate in all things, is an injunction not to be 
slighted with impunity. True progression is compara- 
tively slow ; it is misdirected effort that is too fast. The 






THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 197 

pulse of community should beat calmly when contemplat- 
ing important movements. 

Circle-going may degenerate into positive abuse. Sus- 
ceptible organization may feel the influence of too many 
minds, and a discord be thus produced which cannot easily 
be controlled, even by calmer operators. 

The spiritual movement is now well started upon its 
mission, and people may not fear that it will stop with- 
out their extraordinary cooperation. What has trans- 
pired has been more to attract attention than to instruct. 
Facts have been given — more will come, backed up by 
philosophy. The public ear has been obtained, and next 
the public tinder standing will be touched. 

Too much is generally expected by circles ; they think 
that a perfect work can be performed without tools to 
work with. With crude materials, they anticipate the 
erection of a beautiful structure, nicely joined and con- 
solidated, without the sound of the hammer of discard. 
There can be no expression of sentiment without fitting 
words, and, if those cannot be found within the brain acted 
upon, they cannot be used ; consequently the id5a is born 
distorted, awkward and ugly, with no feet of symmetry 
to walk upon, and no voice of sublimity to assert its 
parentage. 

Educated and gifted minds, if unprejudiced and calm, 
may be channels of higher utterance than the ignorant, 
weak and superstitious. Give the spiritual world a fair 
chance — good materials — instruments fitted to its hands 
— and it will vindicate itself from the charge of folly, 
duplicity and wickedness, which has been unsparingly 
heaped upon it. 

17* 



108 THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 

It will be discovered, ultimately, that the second sphere 
of existence is in advance of the first ; and those of the 
latter state who dictate propriety to the former make 
but a sorry figure. No individual has yet fully entered 
the arcana of the spiritual realm, and grasped and held 
up to view its well-kept mysteries. There has been a 
great amount of quackery in such matters, and a very 
small share of legitimate practice. 

Inspiration has no tendency to make men self-confident 
and vain — quite the reverse ; for while under its influ- 
ence they perceive so much to learn that they become 
as " little children " in pretension — "babes" in knowl- 
edge. The faculties may be gloriously enlarged, but 
rolling ages only can unfold a tithe of the secrets of Na- 
ture. The word "secrets " is here used in a comparative 
sense ; for all things are open to the contemplation of 
man when his mental vision grows strong enough to gaze 
into) the sublimities of the universe without being dazzled. 

Self-development is what is needed — not wonders, any 
further than they serve to attract' attention towards 
the great question of immortality. A wonder is not an 
end, but a means ; a sort of eye-glass through ivhich the 
vision catches a distant view of the hill-tops of the future 
state, and the destiny of man. Those who seek things 
outre, merely for the purpose of momentary gratification, 
are unprofitably employed ; it is a selfish and unworthy 
pursuit, and they had better be engaged in making rail- 
roads, hewing stone, digging ditches, or any mechanical 
labor ; for those tasks are absolutely useful, and better 
the condition of the world. 

Human j udgment needs development : it is a germ in 



THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 199 

the mental soil that has had but imperfect growth — in 
fact, has been nearly covered up and buried alive by that 
orthodox undertaker called Blind Faith. Judgment, 
the soul's tree of life, bearing all manner of pleasant fruit 
when it attains its natural growth. Invisible causes are 
pruning its baffled roots, and scraping the sectarian mould 
from its stunted trunk. In the catalogue of man's pow- 
ers, judgment stands preeminent — it is the angel of 
paradise wielding a flaming sword to guard the portals 
of the mind from error and imposition. Away, then, 
with external standards, and let judgment perform its 
work ! Many persons, educated in popular theology, have 
already discovered that judgment is needful — learned by 
recent experience that neither ancient nor modern spirit- 
ualism will take away the responsibility of individual 
exertion, and place them above mental toil and labor. 
Manhood must stand alone, or never stand. It has been 
an infant long enough, carried about in the bloody arms 
of Eclesiastical Authority, and rocked by the conflicting 
tides of Sectarianism. It is time to let the child have a 
new nurse, and a more quiet pillow. It needs nutritious 
aliment, and congenial voices; to have the sanguinary 
stains washed from the folds of its old swaddling-garment, 
which was woven in the rickety loom of the past, cut 
and made by priesthood, but not fitted to the human 
form divine. 

Judgment is the Lazarus that must come forth from 
the grave, where it has been laid, bound hand and foot in 
the grave-clothes of creeds. 

Angels of truth will remove the great stone of super- 
stition that seals the mouth of the cave of moral death, 



200 THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 

and Reason is the Jesus that cries out, in a loud voice, 
" Judgment, come forth." 

'When dead and buried Judgment is wholly resuscitated, 
it will sit in glorious authority on the mind's throne, and 
judge its world of thoughts. 

In the mental phases of development this king of the 
faculties is indispensably requisite ; and, if dethroned by 
the common conspirators against free thought, will ulti- 
mately be recalled by bitter experiences, when the subject 
will tread every inch of ground over which he passes with 
commendable prudence and judicious caution. The sane 
tion of great names will vainly be sought for the soul's 
authority — it is not attainable in that direction. All 
communications tell their own story, and are their own 
interpreters to the candid and thinking portion of com- 
munity. Multitudinous questions concerning circles, 
societies and spheres, are equally unprofitable. Intrinsic 
worth is the only standard of measurement. No case 
will probably occur where it will be wrong to use the 
judgment in determining its merits and weighing its 
claims to consideration. Names do not alter circum- 
stances or change facts, and are seldom found in the 
history of Jewish seership. 

Some have attempted to " try the spirit" by some 
Bible formula, and, much to their astonishment and dis- 
may, signally failed. And why have they failed ? Simply 
because there is no external test. 

What, then, shall be done to prevent deception ? If 
prayer and reading portions of the Scriptures will not 
throw an impenetrable protection around the mind, what 
else will prove successful ? We answer, try the internal 



THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 201 

test — the ordeal by reason. Everything beside, com- 
paratively, is like making foot-prints in the sand, which 
the next billow will efface. Were incantations and exor- 
cisms efficacious in expelling error, truth would now be 
in the ascendant, and all nations have written epitaphs 
on the graves of oppression and wrong. 

People must first learn how weak they are, before they 
can become truly strong. They must have regard to 
causes, and not to " miracles." So long as they suppose 
some other power will do for them what they ought to do 
for themselves, they will be open to discordant influences, 
and never rise to the true sphere of manhood. We say 
again, let humanity walk, and not be carried. 

The potency of infallible tests, found outside of man. 
in any work, ancient or modern, has been dissolved like 
smoke, leaving the truth revealed in all its significance. 
It points to the most internal principle, declaring that 
God alone is infallible. Much deceived is that person 
who flatters himself that he has reached a position upon 
the shore of time where the surf of falsehood cannot 
thunder against him, and make him reel and stagger. 

The mighty truth comes home with greater force — 
there is no magic formula to soothe the higher faculties 
to sleep, and leave the human mind to eternal idleness^ 
God works and so must man — it is law — law immu- 
table — and he is the greatest sinner and the greatest 
sufferer who disregards it most. 

Away with the idea of external tests for internal phe- 
nomena — the cause has no relevancy to the effect de- 
sired ! 

Invocation is good when the heart invokes sincerely 






202 THE DEVELOPMENTS OF THE AGE. 

and properly, but a mere act is not to be relied on to the 
exclusion of the exercise of the powers which Nature has 
bestowed for the express purpose of guarding and guiding 
the mind. 

The arbitrary power of the past fades away. The 
clouds of superstition are rolling rapidly from the skies 
of humanity. The thunders of terror no longer rever- 
berate around the Deity. The lightnings of destruc- 
tion cease to flash with awful fury about the footsteps of 
God. The former ages stand out like a living diorama, 
exhibiting their fallacies and assumptions in their true 
light. Men need no longer be enslaved — the truth is 
ready to make them " free indeed." The key of ancient 
mystery is presented to the nineteenth century. The 
world may unlock the temple of olden prophecy, and gaze 
upon its sacred things w T ith calm philosophy. Jacob's 
dream is a verity: Nature is the ladder, Science its 
rounds, God its maker. 



LETTER TO A CLERGYMAN. 

You reject reason — teach that it is not a safe and 
reliable guide for those seeking true spiritual illumination. 
You are by no means the only person guilty of this offence 
against God and Nature ; many sectarian societies incul- 
cate the same pernicious doctrine. It is but too evident 
that your theological edifice is not based upon reasonable 
principles ; for a moderate exercise of judgment is suffi- 
cient to lay the gloomy structure in ruins. You dwell in 
a dismal fortress, into which the glorious sun of reason 
streams no soul-cheering rays. This strong hold is 
guarded by Fear, Ignorance, Selfishness, Bigotry, Super- 
stition, and Tradition ; six powers that patrol it during 
the long hours of your perpetual night — there is no day 
there. You exist in continual alarm, and with weapons 
of defence and offence in your hands ; for Reason makes 
many terrible assaults upon your dilapidated fabric, and 
it requires all your forces and much effort to prevent 
him from taking your works by storm. 

The disciples of R-eason perceive you and your allies 
walking about your fortress like grim spectres of the past, 
with solemn tread, and anxious, care-worn faces. They 
see you visiting the different bastions to keep them in a 
state of defence. One bastion is defended by a venerable 
piece of ordnance called " Total Depravity ; " this is served 



204 LETTER TO A CLERGYMAN. 

by Superstition. A second is defended by a gun termed 
" Vicarious Atonement, 7 ' and is in charge of Ignorance. 
A third piece is denominated " Eternal Misery," and is 
manned by Fear, assisted by Selfishness. A fourth is 
defended by a very curious and ancient piece known as 
the " Trinity;" which was originally found on the 
farther side of Mount Sinai, in the possession of a people 
known as Polytheists, and is calculated to defend and 
make good the position that three are but one in reality, 
although it may appear more to those who serve in the 
ranks of Reason. This famous and unique piece of ord- 
nance is served by Bigotry, assisted by an ugly dwarf 
called the Past, a little older than the golden calf. A fifth 
bastion is kept by a gun of large calibre, known by the 
peculiar name of the " Devil ; " it is served by Tradition. 

This battery, though it has done much hard fighting, 
and shed much innocent blood, is at present in rather a 
shattered and dismantled condition. A little more grape 
from the flying artillery of Truth, will be likely to drive 
some of the defenders from their guns, when a gallant 
storming party, led on by Reason, aided by the sappers 
and miners of Progression, will enter the breaches and 
gain a complete victory. Ignorance, Bigotry, Selfishness, 
Fear and Tradition, will be slain, and the fortress of 
human creeds razed to the ground. 

Dark indeed is the dwelling into w r hich Reason does 
not stream its heavenly radiance. The church has truly 
repudiated it; for not one of its cardinal doctrines is 
rational, not one gladdens the spirit with the thought of 
a Deity completely harmonious and wholly good. Let 
me entreat you to allow reason to rise in its majesty, and 



♦ LETTER TO A CLERGYMAN. 205 

enfranchise your mind from its darkness and gloom, ex- 
pand your thoughts, endow your intellect with wings that 
shall never tire in soaring through the calm skies of 
Love, Wisdom, Harmony and Happiness. Worship not 
many gods, nor yet bow down to the God of the Hebrews, 
— a being with passions and sentiments like your own, — 
but bend low in joyful adoration before " Our Father."' 
Let the faculties He has kindly bestowed call forth your 
warmest gratitude. Hold up your hands and thank Him 
with outgushing earnestness for that high consciousness 
W T hich is designed to guide your footsteps to the star- 
gemmed eminence of truth. 

Listen to the voice of Reason, and she will tell you 
innumerable truths. She will tell you that she -first had 
existence in the mind of God, and flowed from his serene 
Spirit into the interior organization of man ; that she was 
present when the stars were enthroned in heaven, when 
the foundations of the universe were laid in wisdom, and 
light gushed from unnumbered suns ; that she watched 
over the first development of created intelligences, and 
crowned them with power and with glory ; that she has 
been a lamp to their understanding, and a guide to their 
feet ; that she has assisted in every progressive step since 
the breath of the Divine endowed men with the elements 
of eternal life ; that she has invariably been present when 
valuable discoveries had birth ; that she was with Galileo, 
Newton, Watt, Fulton and Franklin, when they made 
important additions to science, and presented the world 
new truths, destined to ameliorate the condition of 
the race; that she is the enemy of Ignorance and 
Idolatry ; that she points her finger everlastingly toward 
18 



206 LETTER TO A CLERGYMAN. • 

the God of Nature, and sternly rebukes the darkened 
intellect that bows to gods of wood and stone, that are 
fashioned by human hands ; that she presides in the halls 
of science, in the temples of true religion, and in the 
researches of philosophy ; that the deformed and repul- 
sive figures of Superstition and Fanaticism are never 
seen where she rules and governs ; that manifestations of 
spiritual power may be as genuine and useful in the nine- 
teenth century as in darker periods of history. 

Let us examine, if you please, one of the cardinal points 
of popular theology — " Total Depravity " — by the light 
of Reason. What is it ? who created it, and where is it 
found 1 

It is darkness unrelieved by a single ray of light ; it 
is night whose blackness is not softened by the beams of 
cheerful day ; discord without a note of harmony ; wick- 
edness unredeemed by a single virtue ; an horrible com- 
bination of elements hateful to God, fearful in their 
fevered workings, and as darkly dreadful as the hand of 
Superstition has painted the most lost devil that inhabits 
the hopeless regions of hell ! 

Bring together all the materials of sin ; heap up all the 
evils that are found in every sphere ; multiply atrocities 
by unwritten crimes, whose histories would pollute the 
pen that should record them ; dive into the imaginary 
realms where unbridled licentiousness prevails without a 
dissenting voice, where the wails of measureless despair 
are drowned by the shouts of demoniac revelry, and the 
ravings of mad blasphemy are unchecked by tones of 
reproof, — and you will have the faintest possible idea of 
" Total Depravity," as you have embodied it in the 



LETTER TO A CLERGYMAN. 207 

affections of men. Of all the demons that ever lifted 
their hands in defiance of God's goodness, there is not one 
so dark and hideous as this earth-born monster, whose 
name is written in the scroll of human creeds, and who 
shows his dismal visage every seventh day in the pulpits 
of earth. He is a libel upon the wisdom of God — a blot 
upon the history of the churches — a being that is not 
found in nature ■ — a creature that has no life save in the 
imaginings of minds enslaved by tradition. Total Deprav- 
ity God never created ; he is a creation of Sectarianism, 
the friend of Bigotry, and the yoke-fellow of Darkness ; 
an anomaly upon whose shaggy front the finger of Truth 
has written " accursed;' 5 and every enlightened soul 
joins in the anathema, while the loud Amen of rejoicing 
angels echoes like a song of jubilee through the vistas of 
the opening heavens. The days of this great dragon are 
numbered ; the years draw near when he shall no longer 
have power to "hurt and destroy," and Reason shall 
bind him with a chain. 

Total Depravity ; no good in the human soul ; no 
gentle pulses of charity ; no soft heavings of compassion ; 
no touches of pity ; no chords of love ; no sense of jus- 
tice ; no desire for improvement ! 

Despair, where are thy lamentations ? Night, where 
is thy blackness of darkness ? Human spirit, where is 
thy hope? Falsehood, where is thy vinegar and thy 
gall ? Truth, where is thy rebuke 1 

Total Depravity ! He has no bread for the starving ; 
no silver for the inmates of the dwellings of want; no 
garments for the naked ; no water for the thirsty ; no 
tears for those who weep : no kind words for those who 



208 LETTER TO A CLERGYMAN. 

despair ; no sympathy for his common brethren ; no 
motives which are not selfish ! Most horrible phantom, 
avaunt ! In the name of humanity we adjure thee to 
depart out of our coasts ; or, if thou must be fleshed, 
behold yonder swine with muzzles sunk deep in filth, — 
enter in and be satisfied with that degree of intelligence, 
and thus hasten on to the sea of past absurdities. 

If Total Depravity is a fixed fact, then crime brings 
no remorse, murder no stings of conscience, and sin leaves 
no regret upon the mind. The murderer never writhes 
beneath the lashings of the insulted divinity within ; the 
deceiver of trusting innocence never feels that he has 
committed a wrong ; the hypocrite never shudders when 
he looks soul- ward, and he who has oppressed the poor 
and the needy goes on his way unwhipt of the inter- 
nal monitor. And why is this ? For the good reason 
that the soul is diseased past cure; the system is 
rotten beyond medication ; the whole is corrupt — totally 
depraved. There can be no hope for amendment ; it is 
folly to prescribe ; medicine is powerless ; the sickness is 
unto death. 

Who, w r hile viewing such a doctrine by the standard 
of Reason and common sense, will not cry out, " Miser- 
able comforters are ye all ! " You are workmen that 
need be ashamed — you daub with untempered mortar — 
smite the affections with a curse — say the soul is mortally 
sick, and then attempt to heal it with your bitter herbs 
of sectarianism. How can you confide in your brother- 
man ? How can you trust his solemn professions ? Is 
he not rotten at heart 1 Does a corrupt fountain send 
forth sweet waters ? Do you gather figs from thistles? 



LETTER TO A CLERGYMAN. 209 

Look at your children ; they rest upon your knee — 
lisp words of tenderness — embrace you with their little 
hands. Their eyes are illuminated with a trusting love, 
whose guileless depths cannot be measured ; and your own 
paternal affections flow forth to meet their fond outgush- 
ings of soul. Are they also totally depraved ? Should 
your lips say yes, we should know that they affirmed 
what your heart did not and could not sanction ; and it 
would be as black a falsehood as your own Satan ever 
conceived in his fathomless abyss of wickedness, to utter 
on earth. . The fabled whisperings of the toad in the 
hushed ear of Eve could not have been so foul as such 
a charge as this. There never was, there never can be, 
such a creature as total depravity in a heart that loves — 
that loves but a single being upon the footstool of the 
Father. i{ God is love, and he who loves is of God." 

We know that human organizations are gross ; that 
error abounds ; that minds are dark ; that ignorance does 
its work ; that professions are empty, and sanctity often- 
times nothing but a mantle to cover wickedness; that 
hypocrisy sits in temples consecrated to religion ; but we 
do not know that a single creature (fashioned in the 
image of God) who ever trod the soil of earth was 
wholly bad, without one spark of good to relieve his 
baseness. There never was such a being =— there never 
will be a demon in human form so darkly accurst, so 
hopelessly lost ; so unspeakably dreadful — so sublimely 
devilish. He is but an unreal reflection from the brain 
of priesthood ; the rising sun of Truth will dispel the 
illusion, and shine brightly upon the spot where the mis- 
shapen phantom rested. 
.18* 



HEALTH. 

The subject of health is one of deep interest to man- 
kind. The spiritual man is so intimately connected with 
the earthly, that any derangement in the latter reacts 
upon the former. The first requisite of true manhood is 
a healthy organism. All disease is discord, produced by 
an aberration of function, or a diminution of the vital 
forces. All bodily inharmony is reflected, more or less, 
according to the circumstances of the case, by the in- 
dwelling spirit. The soul cannot manifest its true powers 
in an imperfect external form. If this assumption be 
correct, — and few men of science will dispute it, — how 
important it is that the conservation of the body should be 
made a sacred duty, as obligatory as any that a person 
can be called upon to discharge, as a rational and respons- 
ible being ! Let every man strive, by simple and natural 
means, to work out his physical salvation from diseased 
conditions, — enfranchise himself from the hell of dis- 
cord, surrounding and affecting with its multitudinous 
torments his spiritual man, retarding his development, 
closing up the way to concord and peace. 

If religious teachers had declaimed half as much in 
relation to the preservation of health as they have con- 
cerning original sin and the " wrath of God," the world 
w r ould have been in much more harmonious connection 



HEALTH. 211 

with the Divine Mind, and far beyond its present ad- 
vancement. In popular religion, the tabernacle of the 
soul has been little cared for and grossly abused. The 
body is that through which the enduring principle is 
developed, and educated into immortality. Without a 
body there could be no manifestation of manhood ; and 
, the degree of its manifestation depends entirely on the 
capacity of the organism to feel and transmit its wills, 
wants, and conceptions. 

While teachers have been laboring with misguided zeal 
to "save" what must save itself, — the soul, — from the 
pains of a hell in the spiritual realm, they have lost sight 
of the fact that more than half the population of the 
civilized world are suffering continually the hell-fires of 
diseased bodies. Truly, the watchmen upon the walls of 
the spiritual Zion have given the trumpet an uncertain 
sound, and comparatively few of the inhabitants of the 
mundane sphere have prepared themselves for the battle 
of life. If preachers had studied physiology instead of 
theology, how much more useful they would have been ! 
Men, women and children, would then have been taught 
that every sin against the laws of health was a heinous 
offence against themselves, unborn generations, and the 
God of Nature. 

The delicate woman who is baptized in mid-winter, 
through an opening cut in the ice (which is often the 
case), may, perchance, sin against the Holy Ghost of her 
unborn child ; a sin that cannot be forgiven, because it 
will be written in effects over its constitution, and in 
every member of its sickly frame. God demands no 
duty which is injurious to health. The freezing waters 



212 HEALTH. 

of a frost-bound stream will strike as deadly a chill to 
the marrow of a sensitive female, if plunged therein by a 
man acting under the professed warrant of the Almighty, 
as if accidentally submerged. How many bodies have been 
immolated to forms and ceremonies which have nothing to 
do with the soul's true salvation ! Let the soul care for 
the body, and the body will care for the soul. 

„ The marriage relation has much to do with producing 
healthy conditions. At present, the influence of this 
compact of the sexes is not understood. Diseased parents 
daguerreotype their infirmities upon their offspring. The 
scrofulous mother poisons the blood of her infant while it 
is yet a part of her own organism. The consumptive 
father bequeaths to his child a heritage of woe. Im- 
bruted minds in imbruted bodies reproduce a living reflex 
of themselves* The sour grapes- of ignorance, eaten by 
parents, set the children's teeth on edge. A sacred in- 
stitution is abused, and made a channel for the multipli- 
cation of numberless discords. 

Change these conditions, and how marked would be 
the result ! When exalted manhood, and pure, legitimate 
womanhood, conjoin in the holiest of friendships, a new 
order of beings will come upon the stage of action, with 
bodies not accursed by the original sins of their pro- 
genitors. 

The choice of conjugal partners is not a matter of 
trifling import ; it is a step having direct relation to the 
rising generation, and decides the important question, 
whether it shall be the heir of innumerable diseases, or 
well-developed, healthy conditions. The reproductive 
functions are perverted to improper uses, and cultivated 



HEALTH. 213 

at the expense of the spiritual nature. Time and truth 
will correct these abuses, and the divine human organism 
assert its true dignity. Sensuality, with his sunken 
eyes, hollow cheeks, corrugated muscles, congested brain, 
and tottering steps, will be scourged from the conjugal 
temple, and the angel of Purity, with garlands of peace 
upon her head, smiles of contentment upon her lips, and 
the sceptre of wisdom in her hand, will preside in the 
kingdom of Love. The accordant nature of Jesus will 
be reflected from the organisms of generations yet to live, 
when true marriage relations exist, and the laws of health 
are known, respected, and obeyed. 

A class of ^men called physicians have long made 
efforts for the alleviation of disease. At the present 
time, as a body, they are men of intelligence, exerting a 
wide influence. Under their auspices anatomy has made 
its revealments, chemistry its wonderful transformations, 
and physiology shed its light upon humanity ; while sur- 
gical science has also accomplished much. All these 
things are well, — full of promise to the world, — but, 
notwithstanding, there is much unmitigated wrong and 
cruel deception in the medical profession. Physicians have 
overlooked simplicity in their researches. They have 
forgotten, practically, that there is a divine principle in 
Nature, the express purpose of which is to heal. It 
exists in all forms and organisms, and pervades infinitude. 
So wonderful are its operations, so magical its cures, sc 
universal its offices, that it may justly be termed the 
omni-kealing intelligence. It seems to be the very 
hand of God presiding benevolently over the organism, 
repairing lesions, broken bones, throwing off fevers, pro- 



214 HEALTH. 

ducing sloughs, and performing varied labors for the con- 
servation of the system. The omni-healing power acts 
without the exercise of the ivill, and illustrates well the 
paternal care of Deity. There is something touchingly 
beautiful in the thought that there is a preserving agency 
permeating all the system, and infiltrating the air around 
the human being while he sleeps, unconscious, unable to 
make his own heart beat, the blood to circulate in his 
veins, to carry on the waste and supply, or to repair the 
injuries which his members may have suffered during 
the day. 

This conservative power is more potent than all the 
physicians in the universe, and is the true author of 
every cure. The truth begins to be acknowledged by 
the more progressed and liberal of the medical profession, 
that drugs cannot cure, any more than they can create. 
The curative process frequently requires the formation 
of structure; and can any drug or medicament under 
heaven form structure ? Certainly not ; the Divine prin- 
ciple only can form or repair structure. In uniting a 
broken bone new structure is formed, with strange skill, 
and a wonderful display of something which looks mar- 
vellously like intelligence. No sane man will assume to 
knit a broken limb ; and no more can he heal any form 
of disease. 

What, then, can the physician do'? Much, very much, 
if he deigns to follow the simple monitions of Nature. 
He must labor to know the best conditions for the heal- 
ing power to act, and strive with enlightened zeal to pro- 
duce them. He will not, if he be honest, affect a wisdom 
which he does not possess. He will be frank, manly and 



HEALTH. 215 

conscientious, the same as in all other transactions of life. 
He will not imitate the owl in gravity, or the knave in 
hypocrisy. He will be cautious in the use of drugs. He 
will apply his chemistry to agriculture, rather than to the 
human stomach ; his surgery more to mechanic arts than 
to animate bodies. He will feel that he is merely the 
servant of Nature, awaiting humbly her significant com- 
mands, — will follow, but never lead, — patronize the 
great Dispensary of the poor (whose roof is the canopy 
•of heaven, jewelled with stars), rather than apothecary- 
shops and popular institutions. 

The natural doctor will not be officious, nor meddle 
with a sacred process, above his comprehension and out 
of his reach. He should be known as the friend of 
the sick, whose earnest observance of the laws of health 
entitles his w r ords to respect. 

Medicine has, as yet, done but little positive good, so 
far as the cure of disease is concerned ; but in its 
researches in the fields of anatomy, chemistry, pathology 
and physiology, it has accomplished for the world more 
than all the sweatings and strugglings of theology in the 
pulpit and through the press. But the former is not 
without its faults ; it has ventured to do for bodies what 
divines have done for souls, — drugged them to reple- 
tion. 

We have a few things against thee, 0, Esculapius ! 
thou hast attempted to be the master where thou shouldst 
only have played the part of servant. Thou hast sinned 
direfully against the omni-healing intelligence. Thou 
hast too frequently mistaken effects for causes, — thou 
hast struck at a friend, and not at an enemy, — made 



216 HEALTH. 

war with Nature, even to the lancet, — filled the divine 
image with poisons, — made the human throat a vile 
sewer for filthy drugs, — cursed the diseased frame with 
agents detrimental to healthy conditions, — been a vam- 
pire to the mortal organism, — sucked up its life-blood, — 
sapped its strength, — robbed it of beauty, — given it 
deformity for comeliness, — wasting disease for vigorous 
manhood, — death for strong and hopeful life. 

Thou shalt be tried before the impartial bar of Nature, 
Esculapius. We will call up a thousand eloquent wit- # 
nesses to testify; they shall be broken constitutions, 
bodies made miserable by unnatural arts, and the puny 
organisms of the great masses of the civilized world. Do 
these witnesses perjure themselves? Do these miserable 
frames and decaying bones testify falsely ? Repent, 
Esculapius, and make thy peace with Nature ! Dare to 
be honest and truthful to thy higher aspirations. Render 
thy brilliant reputation more truly brilliant, by breaking 
away from the dogmatism of the schools, the empiricism 
of chartered institutions, the grave hypocrisy of endowed 
colleges, which desire to monopolize the profession, and 
bind in chains of learned jargon the knowledge which 
they should be striving to simplify to the comprehension 
of all classes. 

No useful knowledge should be kept from the people. 
It is the duty of science to put before the world in intel- 
ligible form everything important to the conservation of 
health. Philosophy must open her treasure-house, and 
shower her blessings upon the laboring masses. The 
selfish pedantry that strives to clothe science in terms 
that are perfectly incomprehensible to the toiling millions 



HEALTH. 217 

deserves severe rebuke, and will receive it from sources 
that will tell heavily against it, in the day when genuine 
philanthropy shall judge it. The people will ere long 
take the matter into their own hands, and right them- 
selves. Light is flowing in upon the weary sons of labor. 
Things will ultimately be known by their appropriate 
names. An ordinary farmer, with good sense, is a better 
adviser, in nine cases out of ten, than a shallow coxcomb, 
fresh from college, reeking with the conceit and dog- 
matism of grave professors, who measure themselves by 
themselves, and can see nothing but their own greatness 
reflected from everything about them, — learned egotists, 
whose musty lore is not worth so much as a few simple 
words from the great pharmacopoeia of Nature. 

The profession needs to take an airing in the green 
fields, inhale fresh breezes of simplicity, and inflate its 
cramped lungs a little with the atmosphere of liberality. 

We look patiently for the time when cures shall be 
predicated on principles not now generally comprehended ; 
when any person with moderate understanding shall be 
competent to write his prescriptions, and preserve his 
health without consulting a physician. Such an idea is 
by no means so Utopian as not to be among the pro- 
spectives of man's destiny. The human family has, at 
present, to support too many drug-shops for its good. Go 
and look at them on the principal streets of large 
cities ; they resemble palaces, so splendidly are they fitted 
up. Who maintains those costly establishments 1 We 
answer, Sickness, Pain, and Death, — a horrible trinity! 

The people are the sufferers, — they furnish the money 
to produce show and magnificence, and receive in return 
19 






218 HEALTH. 

dangerous agents, which have no right to a place in the 
human system. A stream of death flows uninterruptedly 
from each of these temples of destruction. Physicians 
are much too wise to drink themselves from these rivers 
of hell ; or, if they taste, it is but sparingly. 

Quackery is not dead yet, and the medical profession 
cannot kill it without committing suicide. We would not 
be harshly radical, or condemn without reason. We 
would only raise a saving voice in favor of reform. We 
advocate no particular pathys or isms, but sound judg- 
ment, honesty and Nature. We would fain pluck a few 
feathers from the soaring wing of learned pretension, and 
check the flight of professional pedantry. We would 
lash charlatanism, whether practised by the boor or the 
gentleman, the doctor or the clodhopper. We protest 
against making the human stomach a depot for the atro- 
cious compounds daily prepared in the shops in such 
overwhelming quantities. We raise our voice against the 
quackery that depends solely on drugging for the cure of 
disease, whether that quackery be in or out of medical 
monopolies. 

Do we condemn chartered institutions and endowed 
colleges ? No ; we greatly rejoice in all institutions of 
learning ; they indicate that humanity is progressing, and 
struggling to lift its head above the troubled and uneasy 
tides of ignorance. But this is what we desire : — that 
learned men should be the friends and servants of the 
people, and, instead of being professors of mystery, be- 
come professors of philanthropy. Knowledge must not 
be wrapped in numberless bandages of technicalities, like 



HEALTH. 21i> 

an Egyptian mummy, to be entombed in exclusive libra- 
ries or inaccessible museums. If those standing at thfe 
head of the medical profession are really illuminated by 
the burning lamp of science, it is their duty, as men and 
lovers of the race, to let their light shine benignantly 
upon others. 

All the principles of nature are simple, and, instead of 
dressing them in garments not made for them, and which 
disguise them completely, let the disciples of the healing 
art put them forth as they are, clothed in appropriate and 
becoming garb. Standing upon the peaceful steps of un- 
pretending science, the student of truth receives her rev- 
elations -with earnest gratitude, not for his own exclusive 
benefit, but that he may deal them out, like a faithful 
almoner, to the less elevated masses. 

Men of education must awaken to a sense of the respon- 
sibility of their position, and labor diligently to become 
saviors of the people. The time approaches, and now 
is, when an account of their mental and moral steward- 
ship will be required ; and those persons will have tears 
of sorrow to pour forth without measure who have pros- 
tituted their talent to improper uses, and hung with 
leaden weight upon the skirts of humanity, retarding its 
progress, and paralyzing its energies. 

Angel of health ! visit the languishing nations ! Walk 
about firmly, like the first-born of earth and the child of 
Nature. Tell men thou hast the keys of enjoyment, — 
canst throw open the golden portals of inspiration, — and 
that thy tread will not profane the sacred mysteries 
within the "holy 6f holies," where God makes his highest 



220 HEALTH. 

revelations to the mind. Strong angel ! open the new 

ark of covenant, — the human brain, — and bid Art, 

Science, Philosophy and Religion, walk boldly into its 
consecrated chambers ! 



GREAT MEN AND HEROES. 

Who are the great men of the earth ? Where shall 
we go to find them ? Whither shall we direct our anxious 
and expectant eyes to discover traces of their glory, and 
be dazzled by the brightness of their deeds % Shall we 
visit the mansions of titled nobility, where wealth and 
splendor unite to pamper the appetite, and astonish the 
vulgar ; or shall we turn our footsteps towards the palaces 
of kings, whose jewelled crowns and golden sceptres keep 
kingdoms in awe, and decide the fate of empires ? Shall 
we seek out the Alexanders, the Napoleons, the Hanni- 
bals, and the Wellingtons, the mighty men and chief cap- 
tains, in order that we may behold true greatness, and 
admire the most ennobling traits of human character 1 
Has greatness a legitimate connection with tinsel finery, 
gilded trappings, golden gauds, stars and orders ? 

No ; our conceptions of greatness flow in another and 
more tranquil channel. We seek not for heroes where 
empty-tongued fame trumpets her hollow mockeries — 
where noisy clamor and m deceitful applause weave their 
illusive garlands for brows as ignoble as selfishness can 
make them, minds as grasping as ambition can bestow, 
hearts as dark and treacherous as the love of power and 
authority can produce. 

To find the great and noble ones, we will not follow in 
19* 



222 GREAT MEN AND HEROES. 

the track of devastating armies, or listen to the jubilant 
shouts of inflated conquerors, who erect their bloody- 
standards on the ruins of smouldering towns, and sing 
their te deums in temples whose altars are red with 
slaughter, and receive the honors, smiles, praises, and 
flatteries of a wondering world, upon hearth-stones deso- 
lated by fire, sword, and rapine* 

"We will not obtrude ourselves into the councils of kings 
and autocrats, tread in the halls of legislation, or pause 
in our search to hear the deceptive, boisterous, and un- 
meaning rant of political demagogues. We will go where 
mighty conquerors and lauded heroes seldom direct their 
footsteps, save to oppress and destroy. We will perform 
a pilgrimage among the children of toil, and the heirs of 
penury, — the great mass of the human family, whose 
bones, blood and muscles, are sold into life-long bondage, 
to give strength, bread and clothing, power and author- 
ity, to those who neither sympathize with their sufferings 
nor pity their degradation. Here we shall discover the 
heroes and the great men ; and here we shall hear, rising 
high above the lamentations of despair, and the groans of 
poverty, the voice of true nobility, and witness genuine 
instances of devoted constancy, unaffected charity, respons- 
ive pity, and heavenly philanthropy. 

In the work-shop, where the hammer makes ringing 
music upon the anvil ; in the manufactory, where busy 
machinery utters its monotonous sounds, where spindles 
hum and whirl unceasingly, where Art and Invention put 
forth their energies to assist the world's progress and 
ameliorate human conditions ; in the field, where the im- 
plements of agriculture play their part in the great drama 



GREAT MEN ArO HEROES. 223 

of labor ; in the humble cot, where Che cheerful house- 
wife spins, or plies the nimble needle; or down in the 
pandemonium of the mine, where sunlight cannot pene- 
trate to carry light and health ; — in all these varied de- 
partments of industry, we can discover heroes that do 
honor to human nature, and leaven the entire mass of 
humanity by the sanctifying influences of their unosten- 
tatious goodness, uncomplaining forbearance, and saving 
sympathies. 

These are heroes in disguise. The world does not 
know them — the world of pride, pomp, and fashion. 
They delve on unnoted, and pass away unwept. No 
poets laureate embalm their memories in song, no famed 
historian writes their story upon the records of the rolling 
ages. The wandering improvisatore seldom trills his rapt 
eulogies over their graves ; minstrelsy never sets the his- 
tory of their deeds to music, and Art never rears the 
sculptured marble to their remembrance. Those few in 
whose hearts their memory is already consecrated, follow 
them to the realms of death ; and so time throws the dust 
of centuries upon them and they are forgotten — forgot- 
ten by selfish, avaricious, and unthinking men ; but verily 
they have their reward, for they shall shine like stars of 
beauty in the firmaments of the eternal country, where 
worth wears its proper garb ; where the shouts of adula- 
ting sycophants are not heard ; where wealth cannot daz- 
zle with vaunting parade; where kings to rule are not 
needed ; where political chicanery is not felt and feared, 
and where hypocrisy cannot hide itself under a false 
covering. 

The heroes are among the poor and stalwart sons of 



224 GREAT MEN AND HEROES. 

labor. They carry out the very spirit of Jesus ; their 
hands make garments to cover the bodies that need them ; 
build houses to shelter from storm and cold ; make bread 
to feed the hungry, and place cooling waters to the lips 
of those who thirst. The producers are the real conser- 
vators of humanity. To them the world owes all its ad- 
vancement. ^The wheels of progress that roll on the car 
of human destiny would have stood still, had not toilers 
put them in motion. These heroes bear up patiently 
under the lashes of that perpetual necessity that bids 
them work to live. The humble artisan, bowing over 
his bench, murmurs not that his arms are weary and his 
muscles ache ; for he feels that he is struggling to fill the 
mouths of tenderly loved ones with nourishment, and to 
cover their bodies with raiment. He cheers his moments 
of effort with the thought of the smiles, caresses, and 
blessings that await his return ; for at home a sympa- 
thizing wife shares all his fatigues and sorrows, prattling 
infancy has learned to anticipate his coming, and vener- 
able age utters its benedictions. 

How despised and neglected are these unpretending 
and untrumpeted heroes — heroes who spend all their 
energies in the field of conflict where bread and clothing 
are scarcely won ; whose only weapons are their hands, 
whose sole armor is hope and everlasting patience. These 
are the children of our Father ; for like him they labor, 
and devote their energies to the happiness of those de- 
pendent upon their efforts. 

God loves these toilers, and he finds them scattered 
among all nations and peoples. Divinely energizing 
principles are going forth to bless them ; the embodied 



GREAT MEN AND HEROES. 225 

doctrines of the Nazarene will walk with foot untiring in 
the midst of the furnace of their afflictions, and be incar- 
nated again in innumerable souls. The laboring classes 
will yet dictate laws, to the world. They will overthrow 
monarchies, dethrone tyrants, and found an empire em- 
bracing all humanity, and predicated upon principles of 
divine truth. They will rend the spoil from the spoiler, 
and the prey from the strong. They will say to grasping 
ambition, " Be still ; H and to the desolating waves of civil 
warfare, " Thus far shalt thou come, and here let thy red 
billows be staid." They shall establish governments 
upon principles that cannot fail, and unite nations with 
practical chains of universal use, and consolidate powers 
and interests on the basis of equitable commerce and com- 
munity. 

The slaving heroes shall fill up, at length, the measure 
of their tears ; and the unerring laws of justice shall weigh 
the drones of society in an impartial balance, and find 
them wanting. The printing-press, the telegraph, and 
steam power, like mighty angels of reform, are perform- 
ing their high and destined missions. Marshalled under 
the victorious banner of free thought, they go forth con- 
quering and to conquer. They arc exciting the elements 
that govern progression. Agitation follows wherever 
they plant their footsteps. Humanity is concentrating 
its forces to cast off its slough. The line of demarkation 
is being established between the live flesh of truth and 
the dead organism of error. Equal administration is the 
blood of the first, and oppression the rotten element that 
sends forth a repellent effluvium from the latter. 

If the knife be employed to facilitate the process, Wis- 



226 GREAT MEN AND HEROES. 

dom shall be the surgeon to direct its edge, and Love 
shall apply a bandage to prevent unnecessary bleedings 
and pains. The waters of life, pure as crystal, are well- 
ing from unseen fountains. The discordant nations may 
wash and be clean. The day of physical, mental, and 
moral redemption, draweth nigh. The cry of sorrow hath 
gone up to Him who cannot hear the lamentations of 
misery without compassion. He is inspiring the people 
to work out their salvation. He is gifting their minds 
with genius to give them power over matter, in the appli- 
cation of mechanical principles to subdue the earth's 
ruggedness. He is acting like Himself — consistently, 
benevolently, naturally. 

The poor men of the earth are the rich men of the 
Impartial Hand ; and the contemptible ones that common 
fame does not recognize are the conquering heroes that 
are crowned with unfading laurels in the realms of eternal 
mind. They sit as kings on innumerable thrones of 
usefulness, judging all the tribes of the earth. They 
are those who have had their garments washed and made 
white in the waters of tribulation. Golden harps of 
knowledge shall be given unto them, and they will sing 
songs of harmony to the wise Dispenser, who has made 
labor a stepping-stone to true greatness. 

Ages may wear deep pathways in the track of time, 
the ocean change its bed, the attrition of centuries level 
down the mountain ranges ; but the bright coronals and 
ermined robes which the laboring heroes shall possess 
will not grow dim, but shine with a more dazzling lustre, 
and sparkle with beauty more celestial, in spheres where 



GREAT MEN AND HEROES. 227 

true wealth belongs exclusively to the soul, where the 
grateful incense of praise arises most divinely from 
consciences that are at peace, and from labors that scat- 
ter blessings to render less rugged the pathvray of hu- 
manity. 



THE CONFLICT OF AGES. 

Orthodoxy not only makes the assumption that man 
is totally depraved, but goes further, and asserts that he 
is continually surrounded by invisible enemies, so that 
he is placed in a state of painful antagonism, and the way 
to salvation from eternal misery is up the Calvary of 
ceaseless mortification, and upon a cross of sleepless cru- 
cifixion. The unseen inhabitants of another sphere of 
existence, educated by the experiences of incalculable 
ages in the arts of deception and in the practice of guile, 
array against the denizens of the rudimental world all the 
dark lore which they have learned, and all the influences 
which can be brought into action to render more lost and 
degraded their depraved and sensuous natures. Yes, the 
highway to angelic crowns and celestial enjoyments is 
full of self-denials, tears, groanings, despair, and a meas- 
ure of self-degradation that cannot be uttered. 

Accept the two assumptions stated as predicated in 
truth, and there are no more tranquil days and refreshing 
nights for man. Not only has he to struggle to preserve 
his physical organization, not only has he to delve in 
the earth and wring from it drops of vitality, but there 
is another and greater conflict with the invisible powers 
of darkness, to save his immortal part from eternal conse- 
quences in a world ^who.-.e revelations, for joy or sorrow, he 



THE CONFLICT OF AGES. 229 

is yet to test. Not only do the demons of hunger, thirst, 
war and disease, track his footsteps and whisper their 
horrors into his ears, but unseen fiends sit in malignant 
mockery upon his household gods, incarnate themselves 
in his being, pursue him to all his employments, and 
reflect upon his mind distorted images, unholy fancies 
and unmanly aspirations; while unhallowed fires are 
kindled in his affections, and murder, rapine, lust and 
robbery, are engendered in the silent chambers of tho 
brain. 

Total depravity becomes a member of every household ; 
devils sit grinning on the social hearth-stone, imps of hell 
play their mad antics with cradled infants, or whisper 
their envenomed malice into the soul of expanding youth. 
The vision of angels vanishes away. The songs and 
friendly monitions of ministering spirits are not heard 
around the precincts of the domestic altar. The smile 
of an impartial God never flickers across the threshold, or 
mirrors itself on the mind. Depraved manhood is not 
enough. Man, " ruined by the fall," must be ruined 
again. The mournful, miserable wreck of the once divine 
image must be scathed and blackened by the charring 
fires of hell. Already lost to all good ; already trodden 
under foot in " the wine-press of the wrath of Got!;" 
already exiled from communion with heavenly intelli- 
gences : already doomed to an eternal warfare, sweat and 
toil, — the measure of his despair is not yet filled to the 
brim, and some drops from the infernal pit must be 
added. 

The Divine Mind, by this system of ethics, is made to 
occupy a secondary place in the government of the uni- 
20 



230 THE CONFLICT OF AGES. 

verse. It represents him as creating existences, and 
abandoning them, without an effort, to influences which 
he knew would work out their fall, and thereby their total 
depravity. 

It is not strange that gifted and intellectual minds have 
at length awakened to a perception of the inconsistencies 
involved in such theories. No wonder that a Beecher 
arises, in the strength of his better impulses, and contem- 
plates the various theological aspects around him with 
absolute terror and dismay. " The conflict of ages " h^s 
become a conflict of his own soul, — reason asserting her 
divine rights on the one hand, and the cruel dogmatism 
of human creeds sustaining the warfare on the other. 

Religionists have ever erred by looking at humanity 
through a false medium. The principles of Nature have 
been ignored, and the elements of mystery and miracle 
exalted to occupy their place. The conflict has not been 
so much with sin itself, as in regard to the best means of 
baffling Satan and escaping just punishment in the spirit- 
ual world. The controversy has been about the means 
of accomplishing w T hat it appears God w T ould not accom- 
plish when he could, while the real conflict with error 
has, in reality, been quite neglected. 

While engaged in furious polemical disputes with 
each other, leading religionists have forgotten to go forth 
to battle against their marshalled enemies. Different 
organizations have devised different ways of fighting the 
devil, and then fight among each other because one sec- 
tary refuses to use its weapons, or to make the attack 
upon the plan which others have predicated. This has 
been "the conflict of ages." 



THE CONFLICT OF AGES. 231 

Religionists, intrenched behind their creeds, and scorn- 
ing the world's wants, have fought, and struggled, and 
torn each other, with the ferocity of maniacs. The con- 
flict of ages has been a warfare of sectarianism. Reli- 
gious partisans and holy demagogues have drawn their 
swords to vindicate their own assumptions to infallible 
truth, while, at the same moment, they acknowledge 
themselves standing upon the platform of total depravity. 
While professing to be wholly rotten at heart, they yet 
claim to be in communion with the Divine Mind, and the 
special receptacles of the divine afflatus. While loudly 
and vehemently proclaiming that invisible enemies are 
unceasingly whispering their soul-destroying falsehoods 
and ruinous sophistry to every " fallen child of Adam," 
they are not willing to admit the possibility that their 
own doctrines may have been received from the same 
source of unmitigated evil. They will follow implicitly 
their own intuitions as sacred monitions, but reject with 
holy indignation the intuitional promptings of their neigh- 
bor. The churches have become tremendous organs of 
mutual recrimination. They accuse each other of depart- 
ing from "the faith once delivered to the saints," and 
spend the week in sharpening their weapons in order to 
be prepared for a tourney on the Sabbath. m 

Surrounded by Satan and his unnumbered hosts, 
depraved and condemned by another's sin, thou mayst 
sit down, man, in the sackcloth of sorrow, and sing a 
despairing requiem over the grave of hope. Thou mayst 
utter thy lamentations in desolate places, and give the 
burden of thy grief to the pitiless winds ; while the portals 
of the tomb, whither inexorable death will soon bear thee 



232 THE CONFLICT OF AGES. 

in his skeleton arms, are mantled with the blackness of 
darkness, and pervaded by an atmosphere of awful gloom, 
that freezes up the fountains of joy. 

There is, indeed, a misadjustment in the machinery of 
the churches ; their dark enginery labors with a harsh 
and* grating dissonance. Their antagonisms have become 
so apparent to the more benevolent and thinking among 
them, that they tremble lest the old ecclesiastical ship 
should never reach its destined port. Not yet prepared 
to abandon their cherished systems, they set themselves 
zealously at work to defend them, and vindicate the "honor 
of God M in not producing a better order of things. They 
erect their stupendous fabrics of contradiction, and then, 
to prevent their being prostrated by the lightnings of 
truth, build over them a more flimsy covering, to shield 
them from the assaults of reason. How strange that 
divines should first make creeds, and then create just such 
a God as will harmonize with them in character ! 

How consoling is the thought that the Divine Being 
can vindicate his own honor ; and that, while religious 
warriors are making a great clamor, and his name a rally- 
ing-cry to battle, He is unaffected by their tumult, and 
receives no pleasure from the contemplation of their selfish 
and unnatural conflicts. 

3fe db dfc ik 3k 3k 

*fl? *1P *J? T?" W ■ ' TP 

i 

Spirit of Peace ! visit the needy nations. Let thy 
footsteps be traced in the dust of fallen empires and 
ruined cities. Wave thy sceptre over a warring world. 
Bid Time erase the records of bloody heroes, and crumble 
the monuments of tyrant kings. Write the deep male- 
dictions of Nature upon the foreheads of lauded warriors, 






THE CONFLICT OF AGES. 233 

and sing a song of lamentation in the track of conquering 
armies. Rebuke with thy voice the ambition of despots, 
and engrave thy solemn protests in the palaces of autocrats 
and emperors. 

Angel of Peace ! speak to misdirected zeal, that fights 
in the name of God. Prepare thy thrilling reprimands 
for the ears of a fanaticism that has produced the conflict 
of ages, and desolated the earth with the strife of human 
passions. 

Say to warring Priesthood, religion cannot rest in your 
bloody arms. Whisper to the soul of wrangling Secta- 
rianism the doom that awaits it when thou fliest on the 
wings of thy loving gospel, subduing discordant elements, 
and reconciling all things to God. 

Bid the conflict of ages cease, and cause the warriors 
to bury their weapons in the graves of the slain. Spirit 
of Peace ! turn the wounding weapons of religious com- 
batants from the breasts of brothers to the heart of error. 
Cry out, with a loud voice, over the bloody cross where 
crusading divines cross sw^ords, and smite each other for 
the " honor of God." Turn and look upon a proselyting 
clergy, as Jesus looked upon Peter, that they may go 
out of that labor weeping bitterly. Proclaim, like the 
voice of the murmuring of waters, that the secret of 
human suffering and degradation originates in the pride 
of opinion, and the assumptions of superstitious dogma- 
tism, that in the vanity of its arrogance aspires to dictate 
law to the world, and make all men worship at its altars. 

Placid Peace ! iterate everywhere the mighty truth, 
that man's invisible enemies are within him, and all the 
unnumbered hosts that make war upon him are marshalled 
20* 



234 THE CONFLICT OF AGES. 

in his own brain, exist only in discordant conditions, and 
faculties and powers unreconciled to Nature. 

Breathe comforting assurances to those perplexed minds 
that have been enslaved to falsehood, and held in bondage 
to error. Pity the weary, painful struggles of mistaken 
pilgrims and earnest devotees, who bow, trembling and 
terror-stricken, before the great Moloch of Total De- 
pravity ; and who, in the vain hope of reconciling them- 
selves to his thraldom, launch upon a wide sea of hypoth- 
esis, and amuse themselves with vague and unsatisfactory 
speculations, deduced from no data, and having no pater- 
nity save in a troubled fancy. 

Spirit of Peace ! w T e invoke thee. Stretch the hand 
of thy power over the restless elements. Soothe to har- 
mony the conflict of rolling ages, and pour out thy 
benedictions upon agitated nations. 



APPENDIX. 



BRIEF REVIEW OF VARIOUS THEORIES. 

Aboxjt four years and a half since, when I first commenced the 
investigation of what are termed Spiritual Manifestations, I seated 
myself at a small table, with three ladies, for the purpose of witness- 
ing the phenomena. 

One of the ladies was of that peculiar organization necessary to the 
production of the rappings and movements. Both the vibrations and 
motions ensued without the medium being in contact with the table. 

After a variety of experiments, quite remarkable in their results, I 
made the following request, namely, That the invisible power would 
elevate one end of the table, while I raised the other ; and this without 
the intervention of any hands save my own. 

To this proposition the occult agent assented. Having heard the 
idea advanced, in explanation of these phenomena, that they were 
merely illusive appearances, induced by the commanding will of some 
person present, I resolved to be exceedingly careful and critical in my 
examinations, and consequent deductions. It being in the day-time, I 
had no difficulty in seeing my three friends, and noting their exact 
position* and relation to the object to be moved. 

Arising to my feet, I raised the end of the table nearest me about 
six inches from the floor. The unseen cause was equally prompt at 
the other extremity. Immediately there followed a slight quivering 
motion, and then the table was entirely suspended. To make the 
mutter absolutely sure, and put the verity of the phenomenon beyond 
dcubt, my wife, leaving her seat, and stooping to a convenient position, 
passed her hands under the legs held up by the occult force. 



236 APPENDIX. 

The transaction was real — an inanimate body was truly sustained 
in air, apparently in violation of the laws of gravitation, by a power 
of which the physical senses could take no cognizance. 

In this phenomenon we notice two facts. 

First : Forge. 

Second : Intelligence. 

The former was imperatively required to overcome the inertia of a 
table weighing quite a number of pounds ; and the latter was exhibited 
in producing the movement according to previous arrangement, and in 
answer to a request which could not well have been responded to 
unless understood and sensed by something. The force was perfectly 
palpable, and the intelligence equally obvious. The peculiarities to be 
philosophically accounted for are, force and intelligence. Force, in 
any case, to be appreciated by the senses, must be sufficient to over 
come the inertia of some ponderable body, be its weight more or less. 

The doctrine of will-force has been started, and persisted in by 
sundry persons, as furnishing a solution of all such movements. If 
human will-force was the active agent of causation, it must have beer 
exerted by one or more, or all present, either consciously or uncon 
sciously ; if consciously, then it was known to the individuals whc 
exerted it ; but, as they deny all such agency or knowledge, we con- 
elude that, if it was exhibited at all, it acted unconsciously. So far as 
I was able to judge, my own will had nothing whatever to do with the 
phenomenon. Consequently we arrive at the deduction that the moving 
power was displayed without the known aid of any mind at the seance. 

That the will of any person can assume the relation of cause to the 
locomotion of inanimate matter, requiring the intervention of motive 
power, of a character more or less marked, varying in degree from 
one to five hundred pounds, is a new phase of metaphysics, more 
astonishing than any problem that has, in ancient or modern times, 
been presented for elucidation. 

In the theory of will-force thus unaccountably exercised, there is 
no known relation existing between cause and effect. If the* mind of 
one medium can induce such marked results, a really tremendous 
power might be operated by a thousand, — sufficient to move a moun- 
tain, or lift an Egyptian pyramid, — and all this might transpire 
while the human agents were sublimely innocent that such stupendous 
transactions owed their origin to unconsciously-exerted will, acting 
from their own brains. 



APPENDIX. ' 237 

I would here ask, What are the conditions of receptivity to the 
will-force ? Are all substances in nature susceptible to its influence, 
and liable to be played upon by its power — the monad and the gran- 
ite boulder, the ant-hill and the moon ? 

Is the will-force ponderable ? Does it, acting unconsciously, exhibit 
all the phenomena usually attending the normal, conscious, voluntary 
exercise of the mind ? 

If the will-force really exists, in connection with human organisms, 
science and philosophy must harness it to the car of usefulness, as a 
motive agent. It must propel passenger cars and gravel trains, mills 
and printing-presses, steamboats and pile-drivers. 

It is not necessary that we should dwell longer on this theory, inas- 
much as it appears, practically, incompetent to the results operated. 
Whether the will-force is intended to be confounded or identified with 
active animal magnetism, by its advocates, I am not able to determine ; 
for they do not seem to have any lucid conception of either. And, in 
fact, the majority of those who look to magnetism as a sort of univer- 
sal solvent, on being questioned relative to that agent, are thoroughly 
ignorant of its nature, characteristics, and first principles. I have 
never heard of a single case where a human being has been so com- 
pletely charged with magnetism, by the manipulations of an operator, 
that any portion of the subject assumed the power of a magnet to 
such an extent as to lift iron-filings, or attract the smallest piece of 
metal of any kind. 

Reichenbach, the German experimenter, so celebrated for starting 
the odylic theory, says of the attraction exercised upon the hands of 
cataleptic persons by a magnet : 

" It is nothing ponderable ; it has no supporting power ; cannot 
even raise iron-filings, and is equally incapable of affecting the needle 
and inducing a magnetic current. - ' 

Taking the researches of this distinguished gentleman for authority 
the magnetic condition of no person, at a circle, can be such as to 
move any ponderable body. 

" It is known well enough," adds the same experimenter, "that 
we are not acquainted in physics with any attraction which is not 
reciprocal." If this be an axiom or unvarying law, characterizing 
the dynamics of magnetism, then a table would be just as likely to 
attract the medium as the medium the table. If the assumptions of 
Reichenbach be strictly philosophical, there is no possible way of 



238 APPENDIX. 

eluding the conclusion which I have made, it being wholly predicated 
upon the data of one of the most remarkable experimenters of the age. 

What would be the results, if Baron Reichenbach is correct, and my 
deductions flow naturally out of his ? We should see tables suddenly 
starting off like a rocket, dragging after them the unhappy medium, 
with all the force of too "manifest destiny," to stop, Heaven only 
knows where ;' and, the reciprocal action occurring, the medium re- 
covers his or her feet, and in turn attracts the table, which now runs 
in the opposite direction, like a thing of life. 

But what are the facts ? 

In the case stated, the medium, to raise the table in question, would 
have been obliged to be suspended directly over it, which, as we 
have seen, was not the case. We find, upon actual experiment, 
that the medium may remain quietly and undisturbed in her seat, 
while the tables and chairs are performing a Spanish dance, moving 
in every conceivable direction, overcoming resistances greater than the 
physical power of said medium could in any way conquer. In truth, 
a table has been Ipiown to carry several persons, seated upon its 
plane, across a good-sized room, when the medium could not, in that 
position, have produced such a result, if all her muscular force had 
been put to the test. We see, then, that the movements are entirely 
extrinsic to the- mediums, and the force exerted controlled by other 
agency. She can neither cause the table to move by her will, nor stop 
its motions in that manner ; neither is it attracted solely toward her — 
it goes this way or that, expectedly or unexpectedly, by request or 
without. There is no inexorable law moving the medium with and 
correspondent to the locomotions, liftings, and tippings of the table, or 
moving the latter responsive to the former. 

Hence it cannot be magnetism that produces the movements of pon- 
derable bodies in the presence of certain persons, because there is no 
reciprocat influence ; and magnetism, in its attractions, acts according 
to the universal law of reciprocation. 

This question being disposed of, next appears the odylic theory. 
Reichenbach discovered, by a protracted series of experiments with 
sensitive persons, that all substances of any considerable density 
emitted a subtile aura, or flame, which was visible to individuals of 
peculiar organizations. Finding this element so common, he con- 
cluded that it was universal in nature, and gave it the name of od. 
He makes a distinction between od electricity and magnetism. He says : 



APPENDIX. 239 

" To that which supports iron, and constitutes the compass, let us 
leave the old name, with the original conception of a supporter of iron, 
which belongs to it. If, then, the term od shall be found acceptable in 
general use for the force which does not support iron, and for which 
we require and seek a name, the nomenclature for all its various kinds 
of derivation may be easily formed by composition ; avoiding all cir- 
cumlocutions, instead of saying the od derived from crystallization, 
we may name this product crystallod, that from animal life biod, that 
from heq,t thermod, that from electricity briefly as clod, from light 
photod, &c. &c." 

The od, according to its reputed discoverer, has conductibility, 
transferability, and luminosity, with glowing vapor and flame ; is 
omni-prevalent throughout the universe, and is distinguished from 
magnetism and electricity, inasmuch as it will not support iron. 

The analogy which he discovered between the od and a magnetic 
needle was that both affected a sensitive person in very much the 
same way. It yet remains to be proved that od is & force, or that it is 
capable, under any circumstances, of moving ponderable bodies. 
Even the very existence of odyle is questioned by many philosophical 
minds. It is obvious that it cannot properly be called a force until it 
exhibits power ; and its only known power is that which it has exerted 
upon the nervous systems of various susceptible persons. It can be 
conducted like electricity, but not with a thousandth part of its 
celerity, and is merely a passive agent ; it can be blown about like the 
flame of ^a candle, with the breath, even when discovered in its most 
positive state. It does not yet appear to possess any more motive 
power, of itself, than the aroma of a rose or any other flower. 

It is because so little is actually known about this emanation, that 
it is seized upon as a cause, to account for the table movements. Peo- 
ple have such limited knowledge of this anomalous od, that when some 
self-confident philosopher talks sagely about it, they scarcely know 
what to say, for the very reason that they are on unaccustomed 
ground. 

I imagine that Emanuel Swedenborg's theory of spheres is about 
equivalent to this famous odyle doctrine. The Swedish seer, it will 
be remembered, advocated the idea that every person, and every object, 
had their peculiar emanations, which were really a portion of their 
. most interior nature. It was this emanation surrounding all bodies 
that constituted his conception of spheres. One man's sphere is 



240 APPENDIX. 

agreeable to us, and another disagreeable ; and Reichenbach's sensi- 
tives would be most cognizant of these peculiarities. 

In reality, the od theory is not yery new. The belief in a universal 
medium has been long prevalent ; but that it has an active farce 
stronger than the law of gravitation has not been until recently advo- 
cated. If the od, or biod, according to the nomenclature (eliminated 
from the body of the medium), has sufficient potency to move a table 
in all conceivable directions, all that would be requisite, in a scientific 
point of view, to effectually interrupt these demonstrations, would be 
an active current of air blowing directly in a line between the gen- 
erator of the force and the ponderable being moved, for it must be 
recollected that Reichenbach declares that this emanation can be blown 
to one side, like the flame of a candle. 

May it not, then, justly be concluded that the peculiar property of 
matter which has been named od has no more positive energy to pro- 
duce visible effects than the aroma of a flower ? Allowing that one 
medium eliminated enough of this vapor, flame or light, to move a 
table with four men upon it, the intelligence incontinently displayed 
would still be involved in profound mystery. 

The idea that electricity and magnetism, in the form with which we 
are generally conversant with them, play any considerable part in 
these demonstrations, is now generally abandoned, the nicest instru- 
ments not being able to detect their presence in the ordinary way ; 
consequently the odyle, being an indefinable something of which little 
is known, has to be much quoted and often talked of by explainers 
and theorizers ; and, as yet, they have left the subject precisely where 
they found it, no person being quite satisfied or convinced, save them- 
selves 

Would it not be exceedingly strange if the brain of a simple 
maiden, acting unconsciously upon an unconscious agent, should pro- 
duce intelligent answers from a table that is being suspended in air, 
or is travelling about the room with four persons mounted upon its 
surface, like a bevy of sailors upon a sea-tortoise? Wonders will 
never cease while we have philosophers among us ! 

It is easy to multiply words, make frequent descents upon German 
experimenters, where their views run in any manner parallel with 
preconceived notions, or can possibly be pressed into the service 
of pseudo-science ; but it appears far less practicable to throw any 
light upon facts which now challenge the attention of the civilized 



APPENDIX. 241 

world. So far as the theory of the automaton brain is concerned, there 
is little to be hoped for in that direction, by way of elucidation of the 
subject. It does not seem that a brain can act of itself, any more 
than a 'water-wheel can revolve and drive machinery without water : 
but should it chance to do so, independent of that element, the phe- 
nomenon might, with some show of speciousness, be construed into 
automatic action. 

In order that a brain should act automatically, it is absolutely 
necessary that the force that ordinarily operates it should be entirely 
withdrawn, when life would be extinct. How a brain can act auto- 
matically, while the mind is in connection with it, and perfectly con- 
scious and cognizing, with all its ordinary peculiarities characterizing 
it, is a mystery which men of sound judgment have yet to solve. 
Mind is the only thing with which we are acquainted that evin sea 
intelligence. Therefore all intelligible manifestations are to be referred 
to that source. A brain and a mind are two distinct things ; the 
first is the medium through which intelligence is transmitted, the 
second the agent transmitting it. The brain itself cannot think, an;~ 
more than the hand or the foot ; and when the mind is once entirely 
detached from it, it is a common clod, ready to be claimed by the 
great law of nature, that resolves all bodies to dust, and makes muta- 
tion the order of the universe. 

Even providing the brain could act automatically while connected 
with its legitimate propelling power, how could it manifest its intelli- 
gence extrinsically or outside of itself — at any distance, more or less ? 
It requires an extraordinary stretch of credulity to believe that what 
mind usually performs with the brain the brain can perform without 
mind. And the assumption goes much beyond this ; for it is made 
to rap, tip tables, write without hands, and spell connected cdfeimuni- 
cations. 

The remarks of Rev. Charles Beecher, in his " Review of the Spirit- 
ual Manifestations," on this particular subject, appear remarkably 
pertinent, logical, and sound. If automatic, cerebral, or mental 
action can do so much that is wonderful, we need not expect to find 
anything truly real less dense than a block of granite, and are fur- 
nished with a ready solution for all uncommon occurrences noted in 
the Old and New Testaments. 

"With the od of Reichenbach in one hand, and the automaton brain 
of Dr. Rogers in the other, we are prepared to march through the 

21 



242 appexuix. 

" sacred book " and scatter its assumptions to the winds. We can not 
only account for the movements, like the rolling of the stone from 
the sepulchre, opening and shutting of doors, as in the case of Peter's 
release from prison, but we are also able to throw some (odic) light 
upon the vision of angels, and various ghostly appearances related in 
the Bible. 

For instance, Mary Magdalene's visit to the tomb of Christ, and its 
consequent developments, might be explained in this way : That 
devoted woman, having a strong affection for Jesus, goes to the place 
of his burial with her mind disturbed by grief, and in an abnormal 
condition. She finds the sepulchre empty, and, instead of seeing the 
body of the crucified, discovers two angels, who address her, asking 
the cause of her grief. She instantly turns from the celestial visitants, 
and beholds Jesus. 

To elucidate this mystery, we have only to suppose : 

First, That the spot was favorable to odic emanations. 

Second, That the abnormal or automatic action of her brain pro- 
duced the for ms and what ensued; for*' it is a remarkable fact," 
quoth the doctor, " which has been found exemplified in a great many 
instances, that when the brain and nervous system are brought into 
immediate relation to the points whence issues the mundane force, the 
odic flame or vapor at that point will assume a human form *•* I ! 

This is very reasonable when we consider that she doubtless remem- 
bered what Jesus had said at sundry times in relation to his " rising 
again," and went to the sepulch:ce with her brain intensely active, 
and expectant of some marvellous transaction The odic emanations 
being very positive, and her organism just in the state to take an 
automatic action, the very natural results transpired which are 
described in the JSew Testament. 

Therefore, when the reader reflects on these facts, and "considers 
the peculiarity of the location, the effects of the local influence on the 
nervous system, reason must decide for the scientific view, though a 
blind superstition will be rampant with the adjudgment." 

Again : Geological formations are said to have much to do with 
these phenomena ; and Dr. Rogers intimates that in many localities 
they cannot be obtained, and the medium sits down like a Samson 
shorn of his locks, ineffective, and like the " rest of mankind." 

It is now quite generally understood, I believe, that there is scarcely 
a town in the United States but has its media and its " spiritual man- 



APPENDIX. 243 

ilestations." Nor are these things limited to the " model republic ; " 
they are occurring all over the civilized world, with apparently little 
regard to geological formation. 

This argument needs no other refutation than facts have already 
given it. I have not yet learned that there are any very remarkable 
geological formations at Medford, where a post-horn was blown with 
characteristic vehemence by an invisible cause, the notes of the scale 
being sounded repeatedly, with the exhibition of much musical taste, 
power and skill. What might be the particular nature of the geological 
formation in this case ? 

"Would it not be well for a troop of scientific disciples of the apneu- 
matic theory, to make a careful survey of the geological peculiarities 
at Medford, in order that we may know precisely what conditions are 
required to the performance of musical sounds upon a post-horn with- 
out human intervention? I would also venture to suggest to Dr. 
Rogers the propriety of a visit to Mt. Sinai, on an odic engineering 
expedition. I can picture to myself that gentleman standing on the 
summit of the mountain, in a transport of sublime, scientific delight, 
at the indubitable evidences of od which he has been able to discover. 
Perhaps it will be judicious for him to take with him a few modern 
automaton brains, in order to learn if the locality where the olden 
covenant was given (in the midst of odic flames and smoke) has yet 
lost its power, and, exhausted by long-continued exhalations, its mun- 
dane influence. I would presume, furthermore, to hint that a pilgrim- 
age to the spot where the simple shepherds, in their lamentable 
ignorance of the apneumatic theory, pleased their automatic organisms 
with a brief dream of angelic vision, and the songs of celestial visit- 
ants, announcing glad tidings — tidings which, alas ! existed only in 
deceived fancies, abnormal conditions, geological formation, and excited 
solely by mundane causes ! Mt. Olives must not be overlooked, and 
the automatico-odylic transfiguration should be strictly measured by 
universal law, and reduced to its proper place on the mundane scale. 

It must be admitted that the work of Dr. Rogers, explanatory of 
the phenomena under consideration, is the most ingenious of any that 
has yet appeared before the public relative to these interesting matters. 
He deserves credit for much research, perseverance and method. He 
has brought into the field earnestness, sense and argument ; qualities 
which, in nearly every other similar attempt, have been utterly 
i: iored. If I could conscientiously add that he is soundly logical, I 



244 APPENDIX. 

would do so ; but he is doubtless logical to liis own satisfaction, if not 
to mine. I regard hhn, in many respects, a sophist or fallacious 
reasoner. I consider many of his deductions premature and unphi- 
losophical ; yet he has admitted so many of the spiritual claims that it 
requires but a single step to place him precisely on the pneumatic 
hypothesis, where the more intelligent class of spiritualists stand. 

Indeed, the doctor has conceded so liberally to the new philosophy, 
that I am inclined to imagine that many persons will become believers 
in the modern manifestations, merely from reading his book ; for he 
gifts the mind with such extraordinary powers while in the body, 
that we are prepared to suppose it capable of almost anything when 
released from it. When the sceptical inquirer has read " The Philos- 
ophy of Mysterious Agents," he will probably never have a more 
exhausting draft made upon his credulity. Ten chances to one if he 
does not immediately substitute spirits for the Dr.'s automaton brain, 
and feel relieved from a painful tax on his organ of marvellousness. 

I hope that the " mundane influences " will not be so strong that 
the work will not have a ready sale ; for it may set people to thinking, 
and thought is the beginning of action. 

To return to the point from whence I started, — I have not yet found 
a satisfactory solution of the phenomenon stated at the outset — the 
suspension of the table, and the for ce and intelligence thereby exhib- 
ited. Will-force, magnetism, od, and the automaton brain, coupled 
with the peculiarities of geological formation, do not satisfy me that 
the pneumatic theory does not hold good. 

I now pass to consider other phases of the manifestations ; such as 
writings produced without the ordinary mediation of hands, physical 
control of the arm and hand, impromptu speaking, and various forms 
of mental manifestation. It should be generally known, if it be not 
already, that legible writings have been executed at various times and 
places, wholly out of the common method, without the hands of any 
individual being employed in producing the characters ; they being 
executed in another room, from which all persons had been previously 
excluded, .and upon paper previously examined, and under such cir- 
cumstances that no deception could be practised. I am personally 
conversant with well-authenticated instances of this nature ; and, 
indeed, these writings have occurred at my own place of residence. I 
am prepared, therefore, to state : 

That if the mind of a human being can leave the body long enough 



APPENDIX. 245 

to go into an adjoining room and write over half a page of letter-paper, 
or trace a single letter of the alphabet, the fact proves the immortality 
of the soul, and renders the assumption too strong to be doubted, that 
a mind released entirely from its connection with, the body, as at 
death, can do the same with even greater ease and facility. Those 
who embrace this theory prove too much for their purpose ; for it is 
as plain as meridian sunlight, that they concede, in this position, all 
that a rational spiritualist can ask — the ability of a hitman spirit to 
perform various things out of the body. 

What more do we desire than this ? Does it not concede all that we 
claim ? It does, and a stronger evidence of the probability, plausibil- 
ity and practicability, of spiritual communication, cannot be adduced. 
Positively, if this view of the case be truthful, it amounts to little less 
than absolute demonstration of the theory of spiritual intercourse. 
Let our opposers once allow (and they have done so) that the soul can 
disengage itself from its earthly organism and perform any act, how- 
ever trifling, at a distance, — I, for one, will ask no more ; for it con- 
vinces me of two important things — the soul's immortality, and its 
ability to think, will, act and produce external results, after leaving 
the body never again to occupy it. 

At this point of the controversy the truth rises in its strength, and 
soars aloft on undying wings. It triumphs sublimely over error ; 
treads it down, tramples it under foot, and turns its inspired face 
triumphantly upward. The writings performed mechanically by the 
hand, without the volition of the medium, have become very common, 
and I have seen productions of this kind of a very high order. 

Books have been written in this manner with wonderful rapidity, 
displaying a knowledge of the subject treated, and a reach of thought, 
that would not do discredit to any mind, however cultivated. This 
description of writing frequently take3 place while the person whose 
hand is the subject of the occult power has his attention turned in 
another direction, or is engaged in conversation on another subject. 

I have examined manuscripts thus produced, that exhibited an 
understanding of abstruse subjects that would be likely to confound 
and amaze some of our modern philosophers. 

Drawings of a very marked and wonderful character have also been 
executed in this way. I recently had the pleasure of seeing quite a 
number of these astonishing productions, which, considered in con- 
junction with the history of their origin, cannot fail to make a deep 

21* 



246 APPENDIX. 

impression upon the mind of the candid and ingenuous beholder. 
They are entirely unique, — original in the most literal sense of the 
term, — regular in design, consistent throughout, yet resembling no 
terrestrial objects or scenery. They were produced with a common 
pencil without the aid of .instruments, and, so far as delicacy of touch 
and softness of shading are concerned, the artist must be a practised 
one to equal them. These drawings were executed by the hand of a 
lady of sixty, wife of a gentleman of high respectability, where the 
idea of deception is out of the question. 

We pause, and earnestly ask the question, What power manifests 
intelligence in so many methods, and so persistently declares its origin 
spiritual ; bringing us, at the same time, so many startling facts for 
which the world's mental and metaphysical pharmacy does not furnish 
a formula? 

Community is not, nor will be, satisfied with the theories that have 
been put forth. The spiritual hypothesis certainly appears the most 
rational and natural. If the churches choose to attribute the mani- 
festations to satanic power, then I would beg leave to say that the 
proper time has come to study the character and habits of that mys- 
terious being who is the minister of evil to the sons of men ; to learn 
who and what he is — who created him, what his mission and destiny 
may be. 

Says Henry Ward Beecher, in a recent article on the subject, "It 
is a long line these men are pulling in, and from a deep sea ; and 
though we believe they are far from having on their hook the fish 
they think they have, we have no doubt whatever but they have got 
something." 

Perhaps this " something " that we have caught is the old serpent 
his brother Charles saw, when he wrote his pamphlet on Spiritual 
Manifestations. So far as we are acquainted with the habits of that 
scaly monster, he swims in a "deep sea," and it would probably 
require just such a line as the learned doctor speaks of to pull him in. 
Will not that gentleman be kind enough to lend a helping hand, and, 
aided by Drs. Charles and Edward (who both appear to have an 
excellent knowledge of the old (see) serpent), give a long, strong, 
hearty pull all together ; for the sooner he is landed the better. Nor 
is this all; "these men" may want assistance in despatching the 
anomalous fish ; and the persons referred to have been engaged in a 
crusade against his majesty so long that they ought to know his " ^iveak 



APPENDIX. 247 

spots " by this time, although it must be confessed that, from last 
accounts (see "Conflict of Ages," page 76), he has not been 
harmed but very little yet, notwithstanding the churches have been 
worrying him so long in their theological whale-boats. 

It is very obvious that, if we catch that " old serpent, the devil," 
the occupation of the churches will be gone, and they can hang up 
their offensive weapons to rust in museums for the antique. What 
can they do without him ? He is as necessary to the popular systems 
as a belief in a Deity. We know who would mourn his decease ; not 
those who believe God is love omnipotent and wisdom omnipresent, but 
those who have bread and popularity at stake ; — for it is true that 
thousands of men feed, clothe and shelter themselves and families, by 
lighting the devil. 

Strange, most strange, that our good brothers do not get him into 
a "strait place," and, setting upon him valiantly, smite him till he 
dies ; but no, alas ! no, it is a bloodless warfare — no one killed, no 
one hurt ! 

If this leviathan has at length been drawn out with a hook, " these 
men" have accomplished more than their orthodox brethren, and 
deserve some credit. I frankly acknowledge that, it seems to me that 
the spiritual anglers, who catch the fish, ought best to know what they 
have caught. They are willing to be enlightened — they want nothing 
but truth. If they are not fishing on " the right side of the ship," 
they would like to have the fact made apparent. 

Come, then, theological friends, and launch amicably with us upon 
this sea of discovery : and, if we have " got what we think we have," 
we will cheerfully share it with you ; although far be it from me to 
insinuate that you ever permit yourselves to think of the " loaves and 
fishes." The great expanse of water appears to us like a calm and 
tranquil ocean of hope, canopied by a radiant sky of joy, and softly 
swept by the breezes of progress. We believe that we hold in our 
hands the line of consistency, firmly knotted to the hook of truth. We 
will patiently bide our time, and wait the developments that the future 
may unfold. Storm and tempest we will not- fear, for, with an eye of 
trusting faith, we will endeavor to see Jesus walking upon the waters. 

THE END. 



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